Advancing Extreme's Sustainability Footprint
Published: April 22, 2021
With the effects of climate change and environmental destruction all too visible, there has never been a more important time to be environmentally sustainable. As you all know, April 22nd marks Earth Day – a day to show support and advocate for environmental protection. Over 1 billion people mobilize for action each year on Earth Day, and Extreme and all of our employees around the globe are proud to support this call to action to address environmental issues.
On this Earth Day, I want to take a moment and celebrate the sustainability efforts of the Extreme team. From leveraging new high-efficiency power sources in our office buildings and products, to donating tech devices, to the reduction of our carbon emissions from employee travel… we take sustainability seriously.
Reduction of Carbon Footprint
Extreme has a 2.2-megawatt Bloom Energy Fuel Cell System to generate power at its San Jose headquarters operating as a utility microgrid. This fuel cell technology has reduced carbon dioxide emissions by 20% year over year and nearly eliminated the water required to produce energy. These environmental benefits also come with cost savings. For example, during our 2020 fiscal year, we saved approximately $348,000 in energy costs.
Reducing Emissions from Employee Travel
Our executive team and our employees have always been distributed and even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic we have been supportive of employees working remotely. Over the years, and especially during the pandemic, this has resulted in fewer miles driven than if all employees were required to report to the office daily. For our employees in San Jose, California, and Morrisville, North Carolina who do commute to the office, electric vehicle charging stations are freely available to employees and fully subsidized by Extreme. During our 2020 fiscal year, the use of electric vehicle charging stations avoided 28,906.86 kilograms (14.45 tons) of greenhouse gas emissions.
In fiscal 2020, Extreme’s carbon footprint related to air travel decreased 49.4% year over year. Though we expect a slow increase in business travel moving forward, we anticipate the volume of business travel will never return to pre-COVID-19 levels due to the success of our remote working program.
Driving Efficiency Across Properties
Our office building in Raleigh, North Carolina is LEED-certified for the core and shell. Even in offices without the LEED certification, we are driving other means of efficiency in our buildings. For example, to reduce electricity consumption, we have implemented occupancy sensor-driven lighting in our corporate offices. Although Extreme has more than tripled in size over the past five years in terms of the number of employees, our data center footprint has remained constant by leveraging newer, high-density technologies that have yielded higher energy efficiency.
Repurposing Technologies
Once our employees’ computers are no longer suitable for high-end corporate tasks, our IT team wipes them and then donates the devices to community-based organizations. Not only does this help reduce technology waste, but it also helps to narrow the digital divide and bring technology and resources to those in need.
Product Sustainability
Our teams are seeking ways to design, manufacture, and deliver software-driven networking solutions in an environmentally and socially sustainable manner. During fiscal 2020, we completed 90% of our planned hardware refresh cycle for our products, and our Gen4 portfolio uses next-generation silicon built using smaller process technology, enabling lower power dissipation for equivalent function.
Next Steps
At Extreme, we plan to continue to reduce our carbon footprint in 2021 and beyond. As outlined in our annual CSR report our environmental goals for the near-term are as follows
- Reduce real estate portfolio and related GHG emissions by 25% by the end of 2023
- Aggressively support remote working to enable an entire global workforce to drastically reduce its travel requirements, yielding positive impacts on carbon-related emissions
- Keep on-prem data center footprint constant despite corporate growth by leveraging new high-density technologies that yield higher energy efficiency
- Ensure 95% of our product packaging is recyclable by the end of 2023
- Improve the power efficiency of new products by 20% with next-gen silicon by the end of 2022
As Extreme enters its 25th year, we are committed to doing more to protect the environment and advance the quality of life for all of our employees, customers, partners, suppliers, shareholders, and our broader communities.