Following President Trump’s decision to take the United States out of the Paris climate agreement, Apple CEO Tim Cook shared an email with Apple employees.
Cook, who spoke with Trump ahead of the announcement, said that his efforts to persuade Trump to stay in the agreement had failed. Despite this, Cook noted that it will have no impact on Apple’s environmental initiatives. Check out the letter below.
“Team,
I know many of you share my disappointment with the White House’s decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate agreement. I spoke with President Trump on Tuesday and tried to persuade him to keep the U.S. in the agreement. But it wasn’t enough.
Climate change is real and we all share a responsibility to fight it. I want to reassure you that today’s developments will have no impact on Apple’s efforts to protect the environment. We power nearly all of our operations with renewable energy, which we believe is an example of something that’s good for our planet and makes good business sense as well.
We will keep working toward the ambitious goals of a closed-loop supply chain, and to eventually stop mining new materials altogether. Of course, we’re going to keep working with our suppliers to help them do more to power their businesses with clean energy. And we will keep challenging ourselves to do even more. Knowing the good work that we and countless others around the world are doing, there are plenty of reasons to be optimistic about our planet’s future.
Our mission has always been to leave the world better than we found it. We will never waver, because we know that future generations depend on us.
Your work is as important today as it has ever been. Thank you for your commitment to making a difference every single day.
Tim”
Tim Cook wasn’t the only tech industry leader to ask Trump to not abandon the climate change treaty. Elon Musk also called Trump directly, while another 25 companies signed an open letter which ran in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal on Thursday.
“By expanding markets for innovative clean technologies, the agreement generates jobs and economic growth,” the open letter said. “U.S. companies are well positioned to lead in these markets. Withdrawing from the agreement will limit our access to them and could expose us to retaliatory measures.”
This isn’t the first time Tim Cook has clashed with Donald Trump, or written an open letter to Apple employees sharing his thoughts. Earlier this year, Cook criticized Trump’s executive order limiting immigration from seven Muslim-majority countries.
He said that Apple employees were being adversely affected by the policy, and noted that they could draw on the expertise of the company’s HR, legal and security teams to help them defend themselves.
Given all the work that Apple has done under Cook to become a more environmentally-friendly company, it’s no surprise that Trump’s climate change agreement withdrawal would raise the ire of Apple’s CEO. Apple was recently named the most environmentally-friendly tech company in the world by Greenpeace.
Via: Axios
