Thinking Ahead: Palantir's Commitment to Environmental Responsibility

One of our core values at Palantir is that we think ahead. This means that we consider the big picture, take the long view, and adapt as necessary to meet changing needs. It’s one of the reasons we believe it's important for us to acknowledge and take responsibility for reducing the impact that our operations have on the planet. As a small business, we know that anything we do is a drop in the bucket when it comes to the actions that are necessary to address and mitigate the ongoing impacts of global climate change, but we also don’t think that’s an excuse to sit by and do nothing.

For the past few years, we’ve made a deliberate and concerted effort to calculate and offset our carbon footprint. While offsetting is at best a short-term strategy to address climate change, it does help make companies and organizations more aware of the real costs of their activities. We believe that it’s less expensive to take responsibility for those costs upfront than it is to defer them to a future date.

Because we are a fully remote company that does not have a physical office location and business travel was limited during the pandemic, we were able to accomplish much of this ourselves, offsetting 105 metric tons of carbon emissions in 2020, 120 metric tons in 2021, and 140 metric tons in 2022. However, as we began to attend more conferences in 2023 and held our first in-person retreat in several years, we knew we needed help.

That’s why we partnered with Offset Alliance, a Certified B Corp and SBA-Certified Woman Owned Small Business to measure and offset our 2023 emissions. They work with companies like ours to benchmark relevant greenhouse gas emissions using global carbon accounting standards. Offset Alliance collected the relevant operational data from us, then calculated our emissions following the standards set by the GHG Protocol.

They then helped us identify verified carbon offset projects from their portfolio. To help address the impact of legacy emissions, we agreed to offset 150% of our 2023 emissions, or 271 metric tons. In addition, another 30 metric tons was offset by our business travel management company, for a total of 301 metric tons. 

The projects that we chose to support in 2023 were:

• High Efficiency Cookstoves Project (Malawi): 175 metric tons
• Crow Lake Wind Project (South Dakota, USA): 71 metric tons
• Southern Plains Land Trust (Colorado, USA): 25 metric tons        ‘

You can view more information about these projects on the Offset Alliance website.

When selecting projects to support, we prioritized ones that support the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), which recognize that sustainable economic development requires reducing poverty and inequality and improving health and education around the world. The projects that we backed support the following SDGs:

• Goal 2: End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture
• Goal 3: Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages
• Goal 4: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all
• Goal 5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
• Goal 7: Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all
• Goal 8: Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all
• Goal 9: Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation
• Goal 11: Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable
• Goal 13: Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts
• Goal 15: Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss

Offsets aren’t the only thing we’re doing to address our impact on the planet. Other steps we’ve taken in recent years include:

• Purchasing quality products from companies who can demonstrate verified sustainability efforts, such as the cotton canvas tote bags we’ve distributed at recent conferences and events
• Adding Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) investment options to our 401(k) investment portfolios
• Donating old, yet functional computer equipment and supplies to support mentorship programs for underserved students and responsibly recycling the rest

Our focus on sustainability is not something we do to feel good about ourselves; it’s a strategic business decision that allows us to look ahead and make more informed choices. We challenge others to join us in helping make our planet a better place both now and in the future.