Our Greenhouse Neutral Programme

Climate change has been a strategic priority for Swiss Re for almost 30 years. It is a key topic for a re/insurer, because it is likely to cause more extreme and more frequent weather events. Our strategy to tackle climate change rests on four pillars, one of which is our pledge to reduce our own CO₂ emissions (see Focus: Climate change).

Our Greenhouse Neutral Programme is the principal means to achieve this goal. It combines two commitments: firstly, to reduce our CO₂ emissions per employee (full-time equivalent, FTE); secondly, to offset all the remaining emissions by purchasing high-quality emission reduction credits, thus making our company fully greenhouse neutral.

We originally launched the Greenhouse Neutral Programme in 2003 for a ten-year period. During that time, we gradually reduced our CO₂ emissions by 49.3% per employee (FTE) and compensated all the remaining emissions.