HP Report: Good Performance on Sustainability (but dinged by Greenpeace)

HP released their 2008 sustainability report today and again, unsurprisingly, it's a deeply impressive effort. HP has pushed the boat out with substantive improvement in the quality of the disclosure as well the accessibility of the report which has been much enhanced with the use of interactive dashboards.

I'm finding I need to remind myself once in a while that the practice of accounting for the externalities such as the environment and human rights is a relatively new game. And yet, each year for the past eight, HP raises the bar and teaches the rest of the industry something new. Without regulatory imperative HP and peers are setting new industry norms and transforming sustainability performance into a factor of competitive advantage. There is nothing inevitable about the competition on green now stoked between HP and its rivals, notably Dell & Apple, it has taken real leadership and insight to set this stage. 

Last year HP broke new ground by becoming the first tech vendor to openly declare its supply chain (or at least the first tier), its a practice that has already become the norm in the apparel industry. This year HP can lay claim to be the first tech player to report on the greenhouse gas emissions attributable to their first tier suppliers.  

HP's copy has, however, been somewhat smudged by the release of the most recent Greenpeace Green Electronics Survey released last week:

HP drops from 13th to penultimate (16th) position weighed down by a penalty point imposed for backtracking on its commitment to eliminate PVC and brominated flame retardants (BFRs) in computing products by end of 2009. Although HP still communicates this timeline on its website, in a call with Greenpeace in February 2009, the company admitted that it would be unable to meet its commitment. There is no new timeline which means in effect, no commitment. In addition, HP has no products on the market free of these toxic substances.

Curiously, the latest HP report dashboards for key goals and data does not display this particular goal though it is still visible on the site. So what is the status of this goal and all the other HP sustainability goals? Good question it turns out.

Tom Raftery of Greenmonk published a statement from HP today which sets out to rebut the Greenpeace charges. Rather, instead I suspect HP may have opened up a whole new can of worms by suggesting a goal does not a commitment make:

Greenpeace say we are backsliding on commitment. The statement is untrue. HP had a goal. Subtle but important difference. This was a deliberate language on our part as we knew when making the goal that the effort would requires significant R&D effort, and when we made the goal there was no clear solution to the problem. HP is conservative enough not to make commitments when we have no clear idea how we are going to achieve them. (You can criticise our conservatism in this regard and that would be fair - but you cannot criticise us for backsliding on a commitment we didn’t make)

HP go on to state the goal in question for the record:

Eliminate the remaining uses of BFRs and PVC from new computing products launched in 2009 as technologically feasible alternatives become readily available that will not compromise product performance or quality and will not adversely impact health or the environment

 James Governor had this to say about the whole affair:

I want to see the likes of HP make big bold predictions about sustainability. Without big goals after all we won’t make progress. Its important we don’t stymie debates by making corporations too scared to fail.

I can't go along with James on this one as I don't think corporations have been afraid to be candid about their sustainability performance & progress towards goals or lack thereof. Stakeholders generally want to encourage open engagement and thus are disposed to give a fair hearing when things slip for good reasons. In this case HP have given reasonable qualification to the goal up front by saying a viable alternative must be found that does not compromise the integrity of the product. Fair enough, so why does this not meet the standard of something HP can commit to?  

I'm thinking this is most likely all an unfortunate mix up within the PR brigade at HP. Since HP's 2008 report dashboard is made up only of goals and not commitments it would be difficult to imagine that HP is anything less than fully dedicated to achieving these goals. And whilst all of this may seem just a bit pedantic, the point is that stakeholders right now are just a little jittery about some statements recently from corporate sustainability leaders that might suggest a lessening commitment in a tigthening economy. They are bound to be watching statements from HP and all the other sector leaders in this regard very carefully indeed and projecting a view industry wide after taking a cue from the leaders.

 Many companies have made long range commitments to 2020 and beyond to cut CO2 for example to levels where they concede, like HP, they do not yet know what the exact solution will be. And yet we must have confidence that the corporations who pledge are also fully committed and capable of delivering as our common good relies upon them doing so.

This matter once again illustrates the importance of independent assurance statements which can go a long way towards testing such corporate sustainability goals and giving us an opinion on what they really mean so a shared understanding is achieved. These indpendent reviews can also help explain and shore up the corporate position when goals must be adjusted after their collision with reality.