The World

Reducing our greenhouse gas emissions

A better tomorrow starts together

Reducing our greenhouse gas emissions

To help reduce NESCAFÉ’S greenhouse gas emissions, it takes collective effort and more than a few people to try and achieve it. At NESCAFÉ, we have a team of dedicated analysts who study our environmental impact and create a plan to help reduce it. When analyzing our carbon footprint, NESCAFÉ looks at everything from transportation, manufacturing, packaging, shipping and even what happens after consumption. We are creating programs to reduce our impact at every step. For example, since 2010, we have already reduced our greenhouse gas emission in our soluble coffee factories in Europe by 49,6%. This is a good step forward but there's still a lot more to do. At NESCAFÉ, we believe that together we can do more to reduce our environmental impact.

Our factories use coffee power

NESCAFÉ uses spent coffee grounds to create real energy in most of our factories, reducing tons of coffee waste and greenhouse gas emissions. It’s a simple process where the ground coffee used to brew NESCAFÉ is repurposed as biofuel to help power our steam boilers. In 2021, this circularity helped NESCAFÉ reduce our factory emissions by 61,000 tons* of CO2e and it also meant we sent less coffee waste to landfill. Like you, NESCAFÉ wants to make a difference and isn’t too proud to reheat our leftovers. (*Soluble coffee factories in Europe in 2021)

Working with the power of nature

One of the best ways to reduce carbon is healthy soil and forests. For NESCAFÉ, to tackle their vast supply chain with hundreds of thousands of farms and transportation networks, we must work to protect both soil and forests to bring long-term sustainable change.

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“By 2026 NESCAFÉ intends to plant 20 million native trees worldwide to help increase biodiversity, and to promote soil formation and soil health.”

When more actually means less

The world’s forests absorb approximately 2.6 billion tons of carbon dioxide a year, or about a third of all the CO2 released from burning fossil fuels. Forests also provide nutrition, shelter, energy, medicine, and livelihoods to around 1.6 billion people.

Unfortunately, as global populations and demand for food grows, forests are at risk of being converted into farmland. By 2026 NESCAFÉ intends to plant 20 million native trees worldwide to help increase biodiversity, and to promote soil formation and soil health. It’s a big job but not nearly as big as what forests do for the planet.

Why soil health is so important?

Good soil does more than grow good coffee, it captures carbon, reduces erosion, and requires less synthetic fertiliser. As a large part of greenhouse gas emission on farms comes from fertilisers, NESCAFÉ is helping optimise fertiliser use by providing training to farmers.

From Vietnam to Mexico, Brazil and Indonesia, NESCAFÉ's field programs will help to improve farming methods, resulting in farms using the optimum combinations of synthetic and organic fertilisers, and reducing the use of agrichemicals.

Big and small changes are all important

To help Nestlé reach net zero by 2050, it’s not only about making some big changes, it’s also about making lots of small ones. All NESCAFÉ factories aim to use 100% renewable electricity by 2025.

We are also working to help create circular systems that will make it easier to collect, recycle and reuse packaging. NESCAFÉ also aims to grow its fleet of electric, biofuel, hybrid, or plug-in hybrid vehicles. And for consumers, NESCAFÉ encourages better preparation methods and recycling tips like boiling water at 80°C instead of 100°C and only filling the kettle with the water you need. Step by step, we are on a path to keep reducing our greenhouse gas emissions.