Committed to aligning corporate operations with sustainability goals, Delta Electronics has been selected for the DJSI World for the twelfth consecutive year and the DJSI-Emerging Markets for the tenth consecutive year as a result of the evaluation of the 2022 Dow Jones Sustainability Indices (DJSI), an indicator of global corporate competitiveness. In this review, Delta achieved the highest overall score in the global electronic equipment industry for seven years and the fifth year in a row, and also scored 100 percentile for the environmental and social dimensions of the industry. The Company received perfect scores in the four indicators of innovation management, environmental reporting, social reporting, and human capital development, while scoring 100 percentile in the eight indicators of supply chain management, information security / cybersecurity and system availability, product stewardship, climate strategy, biodiversity, talent attraction and retention, human rights, and privacy protection in the global electronic equipment industry. The industry-leading scores reflect Delta's commitment to innovation and R&D, enhancement in resource utilization efficiency, and product sustainability, while attaching importance to supply chain management, striving to cultivate talents, safeguarding information security and privacy, and taking into account environmental, social, and economic development.
Jesse Chou, Chief Sustainability Officer of Delta, stated that Delta has long paid close attention to climate change issues and continues to join international sustainability initiatives with a commitment to energy conservation and carbon reduction. We have achieved our science-based targets (SBT) ahead of schedule, and the renewable electricity we use in our operating sites around the world accounts for 55% of our total electricity consumption. Building further on this achievement, we have joined the global RE100 renewable electricity initiative and are committed to achieving 100% renewable electricity and carbon neutrality at all of our operations around the world by 2030. Through all of our collective efforts, our teams in each region have proactively moved toward the RE100 goal by in-house solar power generation and the purchase of renewable electricity directly from power plants, green electricity products, and unbundled energy attribute certificates (EACs). Delta also has a net-zero target aligned with the 1.5°C pathway, and has adopted an internal carbon pricing (ICP) mechanism as a management tool to pay an internal carbon fee of US$300 per metric ton in advance to support our plants’ energy resource management, RE100 projects, and purchases of renewable electricity. We are also motivating our divisions to invest in more advanced and innovative low-carbon technologies to explore more business opportunities.
To satisfy our operating sites’ needs for renewable electricity, Delta has taken the lead in the industry in Taiwan to sign long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs) with wind, solar, and hydro power companies, all of which began to transmit and distribute power officially in October. As a result, the purchase rate of renewable electricity has reached as high as 80% of Delta’ operating sites in Taiwan. Among these, Delta has signed a green power wheeling agreement with Bo Yao Power Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Taya Group, that recently began to transmit and distribute renewable power to Delta with 25MW solar power facilities. It is estimated that 36 million kWh of power will be generated, enabling Delta to achieve our RE100 goal by 2030.
Delta is committed to providing innovative, clean, and energy-saving solutions and has established R&D centers around the world. In 2021, the Company invested 8.6% of its total revenue in innovation and R&D. The total number of patents granted globally has also accumulated to nearly 12,000. Delta was listed in the Top 100 Global Innovators published by Clarivate for the first time in 2022. Its momentum in innovation not only facilitates the development of low-carbon business opportunities but also contributes to energy conservation and carbon reduction. Between 2010 and 2021, Delta's plants around the world implemented a total of 2,517 energy-saving projects, saving a total of 314 million kWh of electricity, which is equivalent to reducing carbon emissions by 245,000 tons. The products shipped have helped its clients save 35.9 billion kWh of electricity, which is equivalent to reducing roughly 19.01 million tons of carbon emissions. The energy-saving data of 11 products, including server power supplies, solar power converters, and DC chargers for electric vehicles, which Delta has shipped since 2015, have passed the ISAE 3000 Assurance Standard successively, attesting to Delta’s achievements in helping its clients reduce carbon emissions.
Delta's board of directors recently adopted relevant policies to formally incorporate biodiversity into the company's ESG strategy to respond to the UN SDGs with practical actions and its core competency. The first phase of a coral restoration project launched in 2021, in which coral reefs were transplanted into the Bay Resource Conservation Area, was completed, and it is estimated to restore 1,000 corals ahead of schedule by the end of this year. To arouse public awareness of marine protection issues, Delta commissioned a Japanese professional team to travel to shoot 8K environmental documentaries, "Life in the Coral Reefs" and "Swimming with Humpback Whales", in the Pacific Islands; both films won the Gold Remi Awards at the 55th WorldFest - Houston International Film Festival in 2022. Delta goes all out to cultivate talents and participate in social initiatives. Its total global investment in social participation during 2021 amounted to nearly US$12 million, of which the costs of talent cultivation accounted for more than 70%. Moreover, it has engaged in a variety of industry-academia collaboration programs with about 130 schools around the world, with an annual investment of more than US$3.6 million. The DeltaMOOCx online learning platform launched by the Delta Electronics Foundation (DEF) in 2014 has accumulated more than 17 million views, from which countless students have benefited enormously.
Delta has worked to closely link sustainable development with business performance. It has included the RE100 achievement rate in the Chairman and regional top-level managers’ performance indicators since 2021. The Chairman’s performance indicators also include DJSI, CDP, and MSCI ESG, and the results are regularly reviewed. While Delta is working to achieve RE100 globally, it is committed to leading its supply chains to meet international standards, motivating them to conserve energy, and guiding them to conduct carbon inventories. In 2021, eight leading technology companies in Taiwan, including Delta, jointly launched the Taiwan Climate Partnership, and Delta's Chairman Yancey Hai was elected as its first chair at this year’s representative assembly. By working with like-minded partners in the industry on this platform, Delta aims to engage with international initiatives and organizations on a broader scale and facilitate the low-carbon transformation of supply chains to enhance their competitiveness.
Note: Please refer to the 2021 Delta Electronics ESG Report.