Our Commitment to the Planet

Like many of you, Lineage watched the COP26 conference in Glasgow, eager to learn how our world leaders intend to address the growing climate crisis.

The new commitments – which will phase down coal and fossil-fuel subsidies, halt and reverse deforestation, support the developing world, and include other initiatives that will help reduce carbon emissions – are each a step in the right direction to meet the Paris Agreement by 2040, but as a leader in the cold chain, we know our industry can and should do more.

At Lineage, we understand the role we play in the global food supply chain. We store, handle and transport over 30% of temperature-controlled food products in the United States and approximately 10% around the world. A big part of our job is to help secure the global food supply chain, and as a company of our size and scale, we recognize that there is more we can do to protect the global food ecosystem from the effects of climate change.

With efforts like our responsible energy reduction roadmap that we launched in 2015, our investment in energy reduction technologies in 2020, and the recent launch of our nonprofit Lineage Foundation for Good – which seeks to help feed the world and reimagine the global food ecosystem to limit food waste – Lineage has long sought ways to reduce our environmental impact as a company through advanced technologies and other innovative solutions aimed at decreasing our energy usage and carbon footprint. Now, we are doubling down on these efforts.

Against such a historic backdrop, I wanted to highlight two ways Lineage is playing its part to reduce carbon emissions:

The Climate Pledge

Lineage joined more than 200 companies in signing The Climate Pledge, a cross-sector community co-founded by Amazon and Global Optimism that seeks to encourage corporate action and called on signatories to commit to reaching net-zero carbon emissions by 2040 – 10 years ahead of the Paris Agreement.

By signing the Pledge, Lineage has committed to:

• Measuring and reporting greenhouse gas emissions on an annual basis
• Implementing decarbonization strategies that align with the Paris Agreement, including efficiency improvements, renewable energy, materials reductions, and other strategies aimed at eliminating carbon emission
• Taking actions to neutralize any remaining emissions with additional, quantifiable, real, permanent, and socially beneficial offsets to achieve net-zero by 2040

Our New and Improved Facility in Colton, CA

As an important step forward in our ambition to become carbon-neutral, we enhanced our Colton Agua Mansa facility to include groundbreaking clean energy technology.

In partnership with PowerFlex and Mainspring Energy, we installed a 3.3MW solar array and 460 kilowatt-hours of linear generators, making Colton the first facility in Lineage’s network to produce 100% of its energy consumption on-site.

Colton now has 8,426 individual solar panels that will generate roughly 5.4 million kilowatt-hours of clean energy annually. Additionally, the onsite linear generators will help the facility create electricity using a low-temperature reaction of fuel and air that will increase its resiliency by reducing grid dependency and lower operating costs.

Colton is the first facility in the world with two linear generators and the first of its kind to integrate a linear generator with solar panels.

Our mission – to eliminate food waste and help feed the world – extends beyond addressing climate change and food insecurity. Simply put, as the world’s largest and most dynamic company in the cold storage and logistics industry, we have a responsibility to utilize our network of resources, set the industry standard and be a force for good because we it owe to the world.

I continue to find new reasons to become even more proud of our One Lineage family. Our purpose has never been more clear and I am confident that we are on the right track to leave a positive impact on the world for years to come.

Greg