Accessibility Statement

Climate


Management Approach

Lilly acknowledges that climate change is negatively impacting human and environmental health. Action against climate change is required to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement and to avoid the most detrimental effects of climate change by limiting the global temperature rise to 1.5 °C. Lilly is taking action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions within our operations and along our value chain. We have assessed our Scope 3 emissions and progressed in our journey to identify climate-related risks and opportunities in our business. 

As a global medicine company, we recognize our responsibility to reduce our carbon footprint and manage climate-related risks and opportunities to support the transition to a low carbon economy. Lilly supports the Paris Climate Agreement, discloses information according to recommendations of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and strives to implement these recommendations across the TCFD categories of Governance, Strategy, Risk Management and Metrics & Targets. For more information, see our TCFD metrics. 

As Lilly continues to expand its global presence and innovate in the pharmaceutical sector, we recognize the importance of aligning growth with our sustainability goals. Our projected growth trajectory entails careful consideration of its impact on our carbon footprint, resource consumption and waste generation. At Lilly, we are committed to implementing a range of initiatives to advance environmental sustainability across our operations and value chain. This includes initiatives to enhance energy efficiency across our operations and investments in renewable energy sources to reduce reliance on fossil fuels and decrease greenhouse gas emissions. These efforts are aimed at reducing environmental impacts while fostering sustainable business growth. 


See our CDP Climate response for more information regarding our governance and approach to climate change and related risks and opportunities.


2030 Climate Goals and Our Progress to Date


Recent Achievements


Reducing Energy and Emissions

In 2023, our energy consumption increased compared to 2022 due to the start-up of a new Lilly manufacturing facility in the Research Triangle Park in North Carolina and increased manufacturing production at other sites. Although our energy consumption increased, we were able to reduce our carbon emissions by transitioning to cleaner and more efficient technologies that help reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with this energy. We continue to emphasize energy efficiency at our facilities, including: 

  • Utilizing Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) principles as a framework for healthy, efficient and more sustainable buildings in new and updated facilities, facilitating the use of advanced energy monitoring and control solutions, conducting energy assessments, and evaluating and incorporating alternative energy sources. 

  • Participating in local, regional and national forums to understand and integrate energy management best practices, and to support responsible and cost-effective decision-making and policy development. Examples of participation include the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s ENERGY STAR Pharmaceutical Focus Group, the Association of Energy Engineers, and the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers. 

  • HVAC Systems Optimization – Sites in Fegersheim, France; Kinsale, Ireland; Puerto Rico; and Indianapolis, Indiana have implemented projects related to energy reduction in HVAC systems. These projects include installation of new generators, installing heat recovery systems and system optimizations. Collectively, we expect that these initiatives will reduce energy consumption at these sites by an estimated 2,000 megawatt-hours per year.

    In 2023, our site in Kinsale, Ireland implemented several energy efficiency measures. The site optimized its combined heat and power system usage, started a new 2.5 megawatt solar photovoltaic system, optimized lighting and implemented air change reductions in their laboratory locations. Altogether, these projects are estimated to have reduced the site’s energy consumption by approximately 20,700 megawatt-hours per year.

  • Chiller System Optimization – Chilled water and cooling systems are some of the highest energy consuming systems in pharmaceutical operations, and they continued to be a focus for our engineering resources in 2023. Examples of some of the chiller system optimization projects include installation of higher efficiency chillers at our site in Indianapolis and completion of a substantial efficiency upgrade of the chilled water system at our site in Puerto Rico.

In 2006, we established the Energy, Waste and Water Reduction Fund to encourage projects that demonstrate the greatest potential for reductions in emissions and energy use but are not funded by site capital budgets. Since then, we have approved over $53 million in funds supporting more than 200 projects. Since the inception of the program, these projects collectively saved more than one trillion BTUs of energy annually, avoiding approximately 133,000 metric tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions each year, measured as carbon dioxide equivalents.

We also actively recognize innovation and excellence in Health, Safety and the Environment (HSE) management by granting annual HSE awards. Nominations represent a significant accomplishment, and the awards recognize our employees for helping Lilly achieve energy and greenhouse gas emissions reduction goals and other HSE improvements. Projects are also assessed on their potential to scale in other areas across the company.

Reducing Emissions through Cleaner Energy

We continue to evaluate how to improve our energy resiliency and expand our use of renewable electricity consistent with our goal to diversify our energy sources and decrease our greenhouse gas emissions over time.

In 2023, 28.4% of our purchased electricity was secured from renewable sources. We have reduced greenhouse gas emissions at key facilities by leveraging on-site solar generation. See locations and examples below.

Additionally, at the end of 2023, Lilly signed a renewable power purchase agreement to procure approximately 450,000 megawatt hours per year of renewable electricity from a newly constructed wind farm. We anticipate the new wind farm will be online at the end of 2025. This will provide a significant portion of Lilly’s renewable electricity needs as we expand our manufacturing footprint to meet the global demands for our medicines while progressing toward our goal of achieving 100% renewable electricity by 2030.


Global Solar Installations



Carolina_Solar_Array.jpgSolar array at Lilly’s Carolina, Puerto Rico facility.

article-inline-image-solarArrayParking canopy solar array at Lilly’s Fegersheim, France location.

article-inline-image-aerial-photo-solar-farm-IE43-IE42-mar252021Solar array at Lilly’s Kinsale, Ireland location.

Energy resiliency is about ensuring our facilities have a reliable supply of energy and contingency measures in place in the event of a power failure.

Combined heat and power systems provide energy resilience by supplying electricity and thermal energy to facilities on a continuous basis with the ability to operate independently from the grid. This reduces the risks associated with energy supply disruptions or climate-related events.

At the end of 2022, we brought a new tri-generation (trigen) system on-line at our Sesto, Italy site. This highly efficient system combusts natural gas to generate electricity. Heat from the engine is then utilized to generate thermal energy (steam and hot water) and chilled water. 2023 represented the first full year of service for this new system, which contributed efficiency improvements at the site.

Our GREENDirections program, which applies to Lilly’s sales and marketing affiliates around the world, focuses on fleet fuel economy and greenhouse gas emissions reduction, office energy conservation and waste reduction. Each year, our affiliates look for opportunities to enhance their environmental performance.

We optimize the fuel efficiency and reduce the greenhouse gas emissions generated by our sales force fleet by choosing vehicles with better fuel economy and promoting driving and work practices that emphasize safety and fuel savings. We have introduced hybrid or electric fleet vehicles in several geographies where infrastructure is available. For example, Lilly’s fleet in Japan consists of approximately 80% hybrid vehicles, our UK fleet consists of approximately 50% hybrid vehicles and several of our European affiliates have begun including electric vehicles in their fleet offering. By centrally managing vehicle selection across the EU, Japan and the U.S., we improve efficiency and promote the implementation of strong safety and environmental standards.

For several years, our Green Logistics initiatives have been integral in reducing emissions in our supply chain. By shifting the transportation of products and materials to less carbon-intensive methods such as ocean shipping versus air, transitioning to reusable shipping containers and implementing recycling programs, we have taken steps to reduce emissions and waste generated within our supply chain.

We employ green logistics strategies and programs to better track and reduce emissions, including:

  • Air-to-Ocean Project – Launched in 2015, the Air-to-Ocean project aims to shift global transportation from air to sea freight, where practical, which has a substantially lower carbon footprint.

  • CO2 Dashboard – To support more informed decisions about climate impact, we created a CO2 dashboard to track the relative carbon footprint of different transportation options. The dashboard enables our logistics team to compare the CO2 emissions for shipping routes and transportation modes from logistics partners.

Off-Setting through Carbon Removal Projects

While our primary strategy is to directly reduce emissions and replace carbon-intensive sources with clean energy sources where possible, to achieve carbon neutrality we recognize the remaining emissions will need to be offset by purchasing certificates from climate protection projects with recognized quality standards. In 2023, we did not purchase any carbon offsets. The decision to purchase offsets will be made based on the remaining emissions that cannot be eliminated.


Climate Performance Data

Greenhouse Gas Emissions (Market-Based)(1)
2020
2021
2022
2023
Greenhouse Gas Emissions (Scope 1 and Scope 2) (metric tonnes CO2e)2
 2020:
710,000
 2021:
623,000
 2022:
545,000
 2023:
527,000
Scope 1
 2020:
159,000
 2021:
157,000
 2022:
171,000
 2023:
182,000
Scope 23
 2020:
551,000
 2021:
466,000
 2022:
374,000
 2023:
345,000
Value-Chain Greenhouse Gas Emissions
2020
2021
2022
2023
Scope 3 Emissions (metric tonnes CO2e)4
 2020:
176,000 (limited data scope - see footnote 4)
 2021:
2,987,000
 2022:
3,179,000
 2023:
To be reported in second half of 2024
Energy
2020
2021
2022
2023
Total Energy Consumption (million BTUs)
 2020:
6,200,000
 2021:
6,100,000
 2022:
6,130,000
 2023:
7,240,000
Direct Energy Consumption (million BTUs)5
 2020:
1,700,000
 2021:
1,600,000
 2022:
1,950,000
 2023:
2,910,000
Indirect Energy Consumption (million BTUs)6
 2020:
4,500,000
 2021:
4,500,000
 2022:
4,180,000
 2023:
4,330,000
Renewable Electricity
 2020:
7.0%
 2021:
9.6%
 2022:
14.4%
 2023:
28.4%
Climate Goals
2030 Goal
2023 Performance
100% Renewable Electricity
 2030 Goal:
100%
 2023 Performance:
28.4%
Carbon Neutral (Market-Based Scope 1 and Scope 2)
 2030 Goal:
Carbon Neutral
 2023 Performance:
527,000 tonnes CO2e
Enhance Tracking and Reporting of Full Value-Chain Emissions (Scope 3)
 2030 Goal:
N/A
 2023 Performance:
On track

Footnotes

Note: Data may be revised compared to prior reports due to changes in calculation methodology and other factors. Some segments do not add up to totals due to rounding. 

Note: Bureau Veritas was engaged by Eli Lilly and Company to provide limited assurance in relation to specified 2023 environmental performance data presented. 

  1. A location-based method reflects the average emissions intensity of grids on which energy consumption occurs (using mostly grid-average emission factor data). A market-based method reflects emissions from electricity that companies have purposefully chosen (or their lack of choice). It derives emission factors from contractual instruments, which include any type of contract between two parties for the sale and purchase of energy bundled with attributes about the energy generation, or for unbundled attribute claims. See GHP Protocol Scope 2 Guidance. In 2020, Lilly did not differentiate between market-based and location-based emissions calculations. 

  2. Includes Scope 1 emissions and energy from onsite fuel combustion, refrigerants, process emissions and mobile combustion sources; and Scope 2 emissions and energy from site-purchased energy (i.e., electricity, steam and chilled water). For smaller locations not billed directly to Lilly, data are estimated based on square footage. 

  3. For Scope 2, production mix emission factors from carbonfootprint.com are used to calculate emissions for all electricity usage outside the US except for Canada, UK, and Australia. The production mix emission factors account for both scope 2 and scope 3 FERA emissions, which is aligned with what was used in the 2022 inventory.

  4. All 15 categories within the Scope 3 emissions have been assessed, verified and reported.

  5. Data includes energy from combustion of coal, fuel oil, natural gas and liquid propane. 2023 onwards, this data also includes energy used by aircraft, sales fleet and on-site generated renewable electricity. 

  6. Data includes energy from purchased electricity, steam and chilled water.

Explore our Environmental Goals and Progress

See important information about our Sustainability report.