Being kind to the planet means applying a sustainability lens to every aspect of our business — from our workplaces to our products and throughout our supply chain. The Planet section of our report describes our efforts in 2022 to fulfill our climate commitments, take responsibility for our carbon footprint, and use our platform to raise climate crisis awareness and empower Snapchatters to take action.
Planet
Our Climate Strategy
As a company with products that touch millions of young people’s lives, we feel compelled to take decisive action to address climate change through our platform and operations. Our Climate Action Plan spans three interlocking pillars: Measurement, Mitigation, and Engagement.
In 2022 we continued to make progress on fulfilling our first major climate commitments focused on climate mitigation and operational improvements. We also continued to use our platform to engage users on the climate crisis, foster awareness, and inspire collective action.
Emission Reduction Measures
Each year, we calculate Snap’s material emission sources in accordance with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol control approach. We compare the results against our 2019 baseline year, allowing us to track emissions over time.
In 2022, our scope 1 emissions grew as our physical location footprint expanded. We remain committed to being carbon negative, and continue to offset 100% of our scope 1 emissions through verified carbon removal credits. Our renewable electricity purchases were applied to 100% of our scope 2 emissions for all owned and operated Snap locations. Although our overall scope 3 emissions have grown as we scale as a company, our emissions intensity by revenue has decreased by 20% since our baseline year of 2019.
Our Products
Although Snap doesn’t mass produce physical products or operate data centers, our products still have environmental impacts — and we’re working to minimize them. Alongside our partners’ own aggressive climate goals, we continually seek to reduce our computing and storage needs and increase our app’s efficiency. We also implement processes to help reduce environmental impacts related to Snap hardware products as we continue to grow this area of our business.
In 2022, we grew our global community of Daily Active Users by 17%* while reducing global energy consumption from the use of Snapchat by 12% per community member. Additionally, our carbon emissions related to cloud storage effectively stayed neutral throughout this growth in Daily Active Users.
*Snap Inc. internal data in Q4 2022 as compared to Q4 2021.
Download the 2023 CitizenSnap Report
We recount our efforts, our shortcomings, and offer a way forward.
1 AB 1305 Disclosure (https://citizen.snap.com/ab-1305-disclosure): Snap has committed to being Net Negative by 2030, meaning we will remove more carbon than we are emitting. Snap conducts an annual inventory of its scope 1, 2 & 3 greenhouse gas emissions (Pg. 25 of the 2023 CitizenSnap Report https://citizen.snap.com/2023-citizen-snap-report), which we use to track progress on our emissions mitigation goals and commitments. In alignment with AB 1305's emphasis on factual transparency, our 2024 emissions reduction strategy is anchored in specific and measurable targets.