Environmental Stewardship

Each day we strive to take innovative steps to reduce our dependence on natural resources and operate efficiently in all aspects of our business. In our view, reducing our environmental footprint — and pursuing energy and resource savings in the process — is the right thing to do for our stakeholders and the environment. Our Real Estate and Corporate Services team leads these efforts and guides our strategies to effectively manage our buildings, equipment, and fleet. We report our environmental efforts to inform our stakeholders of the efforts we’re making, the initiatives and steps taken, and the forward movement on our commitments.

We continue to seek investments in facilities, equipment, and company vehicles that are increasingly energy and fuel-efficient to support better environmental outcomes while also reducing the costs that our customers ultimately bear. By taking action to reduce the environmental impact of our business operations, we believe that we can not only be responsible environmental stewards, but also create a sustainable business in line with our Core Values and enhance our resilience.

Energy and carbon emissions management

As we look forward to the future, we’re excited to continue to be responsible environmental stewards. We previously announced a goal of carbon neutrality by the end of 2025 for Scope 1 and 2, which will help set the path to net-zero in the following decade. To achieve this, we’re working to reduce our carbon footprint through several means, including investing in renewable energy, exploring fuel-efficient vehicle alternatives, and continuing to focus on efficiency and conservation opportunities within our commercial real estate portfolio, an initiative started over 15 years ago. These efforts have included shifting from fluorescent to LED lighting in core campus locations. We also focus on calibrated automation efforts to optimize and conserve heating, cooling, and lighting and consider other ways to more efficiently operate our facilities given the reduced in-office presence due to the hybrid workforce model.

In recent years, we’ve expanded our green energy investments to further reduce our impact on the environment. In 2022, we completed construction on a 1.8-megawatt solar array at one of our main campus locations near Cleveland, Ohio, which went live in January 2023 and will reduce that location’s annual carbon emissions. In 2020, we entered a three-year renewable energy agreement with a wind farm in Pennsylvania, which was expected to reduce our electricity-related carbon emissions by nearly 31,000 metrics tons annually (70,000MWh) beginning in 2021. To accommodate real estate portfolio changes and ongoing energy efficiency projects, during 2022, we amended our renewable energy purchase from the initial 70,000 MWh to align consumption, providing for a purchase of approximately 65,000 MWh in 2022. Our renewable energy initiatives and investments in energy- and fuel-efficient facilities, equipment, and company vehicles create shared value for our business and stakeholders, supporting our efforts to reduce carbon emissions and pass along cost savings to our customers.

Our emissions reductions

Although the original timeline goal was 2022, we surpassed our goal of achieving a 68% reduction in carbon emissions per million policies in force (PIFs) compared to 2008 in 2021. In 2022, we continued to expand the way we manage, track, and report our emissions. We revised our electric and gas consumption calculations to include less estimated site readings across our real estate portfolio.

Scope 1 and 2 Carbon Emissions 2008-2022 [1]

Scope 1 and 2 (Location-Based) Carbon Emissions Scope 1 and 2 (Market-Based) Carbon Emissions
Total Emissions (Location-Based) per Million PIF Total Emissions (Market-Based) per Million PIF
Absolute measure (tons)
Intensity measure (tons/millions PIFs)

[1] Includes carbon emissions from electricity and natural gas consumption, fuel used by fleet vehicles, company aircraft, generators, and refrigerants. The volume of carbon emissions from these sources have been estimated using actual real estate portfolio information and industry standard calculation methods. Emission factors were adjusted for 2022 calculations to reflect updates to standards. Prior years were not retroactively updated. In 2021, Progressive began purchasing Renewable Energy Credits (RECs) to begin reducing emissions which has been reflected in the market-based figures. Emissions intensity factors were updated in 2022 to reflect U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) standards and will be reviewed annually as part of Progressive’s emissions reporting efforts.

Responsible waste management

We’re committed to reducing and responsibly managing the waste generated by our building operations. Recycling programs for office paper, cardboard, aluminum cans, and plastic and glass bottles were developed in the past and remain in place today. These programs were developed to reduce the waste we send to landfills and encourage recycling at our campus locations. As a result of these initiatives, approximately 24% (440 tons) of the waste collected at our campuses was diverted from landfills to recycling centers in 2022. Due to reduced building occupancy, efforts to optimize and realign waste removal were implemented in 2022 and waste removal at many service locations switched from weekly to every other week or on-call. These efforts are expected to result in reduced expenses as well as the number of miles driven on our behalf by our waste removal vendor. Another way we manage waste is by continuing to reuse and donate furniture to local nonprofit organizations around the greater Cleveland area. This reduces furniture waste and supports local organizations.

For Earth Day in 2022, we partnered with a local organization in Cleveland to foster collaboration and build awareness around responsible resource consumption, disposal strategies, and recycling through virtual and in-person events.

Looking forward

As we look forward to the future, we're excited to continue to be responsible environmental stewards. An important part of our culture is to work toward creating a better future for not only our employees but also for our communities, shareholders, and the millions of customers who trust us to protect what’s most important to them. In honoring that commitment, we announced our goal of being carbon neutral (for Scope 1 and 2 emissions) by the end of 2025, and we're working to chart a course with the goal of being net-zero the following decade.

We expect that Progressive’s plan to be net-zero will leverage the continued application of operational efficiencies and ongoing efforts to reduce emission outputs. We look forward to exploring new ways to optimize our approach to emissions reduction, waste management, and fleet operations. We believe our commitment to sustainability will shift us toward operating more efficiently.