This evolution is informed by learnings gathered through decades of work in sustainability, periodic assessment of progress and identified challenges. Achieving these ambitions will require continued investments in innovation and infrastructure solutions, enabling legislation and further collaboration with bottling partners, industry peers, local governments and civil society.
The company is prioritizing goals and actions that seek to improve water security in high-risk locations, reduce packaging waste and decrease emissions, and is extending the timeframe to 2035.
"We remain committed to building long-term business resilience and earning our social license to operate through our evolved voluntary environmental goals," said Bea Perez, Executive Vice President and Global Chief Communications, Sustainability & Strategic Partnerships Officer at The Coca‑Cola Company. "These challenges are complex and require us to drive more effective and efficient resource allocation and work collaboratively with partners to deliver lasting positive impact."
The following 2035 goals replace previous environmental goals set by the company related to water, packaging, climate and agriculture.
Water
- Aim to return more than 100% of the water used in finished products globally, on an aggregate level, to nature and communities. Since 2015, the company1 has met or exceeded this goal.
- Seek to return 100% of the total water used in each of the more than 200 high-risk locations across the Coca‑Cola system.
Water is essential to people and ecosystems and is the main ingredient in the company’s products. Because water is sourced locally, the company aims to reach 100% replenishment of water used in each of the more than 200 high-risk locations across the Coca‑Cola system. The locations, which represent almost a third of the Coca‑Cola system’s locations2 globally, were identified following an extensive analysis updated in 20243.
The risk profile of the Coca‑Cola system’s production facilities is expected to be reassessed within five years to help ensure investments and actions are appropriately calibrated to help improve water security where the company operates.
The company continues to focus on promoting water stewardship, increasing water use efficiency and treating and returning safe water to communities.
Packaging
- Aim to use 35% to 40% recycled material4 in primary packaging (plastic, glass and aluminum), including increasing recycled plastic use to 30% to 35% globally.
- Help ensure the collection of 70% to 75% of the equivalent number of bottles and cans introduced into the market annually.
The company offers beverages in a variety of packaging formats – glass and plastic bottles, aluminum cans and refillable packaging. Each option can play a role in helping reduce packaging waste and emissions. The company is focusing its efforts to use more recycled material in primary packaging and supporting collection rates, both of which require enabling policies and the growth of collection infrastructure. The company intends to continue to invest in refillable packaging where infrastructure already exists. The Coca‑Cola system aims to focus on measurable and interconnected actions under two pillars: Design and Partner to Collect.
Design
- The company is focused on ensuring that its primary packaging is recyclable. Almost all (more than 95%)5 of the company’s primary consumer packaging is designed to be recycled, and it is working to resolve the remaining packages.
- The use of recycled content in primary packaging can help reduce the company’s emissions. This effort, combined with innovations such as lightweighting, can avoid the additional use of virgin plastic. Costs, quality and scaling innovation are dynamic external factors that will affect implementation.
Partner to Collect
- The collection and recycling of beverage packaging remains challenging, as every state and country has unique systems, infrastructure, regulatory environments and sets of consumer behaviors. Collective action is needed to support packaging collection infrastructure and policies. The company will continue to focus on increased advocacy for well-designed collection systems, as these are often the most efficient ways to improve packaging collection rates.
- If the company reaches its 70% to 75% collection rate ambition, it intends to continue working to further increase collection over the long term. The company also intends to invest to expand the use of refillable packaging in markets where infrastructure is in place to support this important part of the company’s portfolio.
Through collaboration with local and global partners, the company will continue to expand its design innovations, explore new collection models or improve existing ones, invest in local infrastructure and engage with policymakers.
