Environmental compliance
We maintain compliance with applicable environmental laws, regulations, and other obligations.
ON THIS PAGE:
Environmental policy
Cisco's Corporate Environmental Policy outlines our high-level framework, driving continuous improvement of Cisco's environmental performance. We use our annual Purpose Report and ESG Reporting Hub to detail our environmental policies. Our Environmental Management System (EMS) drives continual improvement in our business processes, products, and services to address our environmental impacts.
Corporate Environmental Policy
Policy statement:
Our approach to protecting the environment is to set long-term goals to address the environmentally significant impacts from our products and business operations. Our most material environmental issues are energy and greenhouse gases, managing product end-of-life, and implementing circular economy principles to conserve the Earth's resources.
Cisco is committed to:
- Reduce impact: Cisco addresses negative environmental impacts from our operations, extended operations (supply chain) including distribution and logistics, and throughout the lifecycle of our products.
- Expand policy coverage: We will continue efforts to implement our environmental policies consistently across all Cisco operations and legal entities worldwide, all extended operations, and all products.
- Govern with ISO 14001: Governance of our environment-related efforts use our externally certified ISO 14001 environmental management system.
- Maintain compliance: We maintain compliance with applicable environmental laws, regulations and other obligations. When our own requirements are more stringent, we operate to these higher standards. We expect this same compliance of our key business partners and contractors.
- Take a broad approach: The scope of our EMS includes energy management and GHG emissions, product and packaging materials, water, biodiversity and land use, solid waste from operations, liquid effluents, and non-GHG emissions.
- Collaborate: We will work with suppliers, industry organizations, customers, employees, advocacy groups, academia and other stakeholders to address environmental impact.
- Prioritize actions: We will identify key environmental topics using our ESG materiality assessment1, conducted every two years.
- Evaluate and improve: We will continue to evaluate and review annually, using our EMS, the impact of our business on the environment, set goals to reduce these impacts, and measure our progress; and report performance in our annual Purpose Report and on our ESG Reporting Hub.
- Drive progress with goals: We will set unambiguous, public environmental goals to drive improvement and demonstrate accountability.
For more information about Cisco's EMS, please contact bms-listening@cisco.com.
1 ESG materiality, as referred to in this website and in our ESG reporting, and our ESG materiality assessment process are different from "materiality" in the context of Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") disclosure obligations. Issues deemed material for purposes of our ESG reporting and for purposes of determining our ESG strategy may not be considered material for SEC reporting purposes, nor does inclusion of information in our ESG reporting indicate that the topic or information is material to Cisco's business or operating results.
ISO 14001 EMS
Cisco's ISO 14001 Environmental Management System (EMS) is a global framework that touches all functions and aspects of our ESG program. It relies on individual accountability, management responsibility, measurement of key performance indicators (KPIs), and a continuous improvement philosophy to meet business and environment goals and drive environmental performance.
Our EMS is certified by TUV SUD America Inc. to the international EMS standard ISO 14001:2015. A copy of our EMS certification is available for download.
We select Cisco sites for ISO 14001 certification based on those with the greatest potential to reduce negative impacts and enhance positive impacts. Criteria including:
- Facility size and lab area
- Building headcount capacity or persons housed
- Primary facility function
- Business or customer needs
Following site selection, we calculate an environmental score to help measure performance over time using an evaluation of its associated impacts, including corporate functional areas; associated products, activities, or services at that location; and the environmental impacts associated with the generation or use of materials, impacts on air and water, and depletion of natural resources. Each site aligns with Cisco's corporate sustainability priorities, in addition to site-specific goals. Cisco continually assesses existing sites and acquisitions against the certification criteria and incorporates them into the ISO 14001 certification roadmap to meet business and customer needs. The table below shows Cisco's global ISO 14001-certified site locations by region.
| Americas | Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) | Asia Pacific, Japan, China, and India (APJCI) |
|---|---|---|
Americas:
|
Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA):
|
Asia Pacific, Japan, China, and India (APJCI):
|
Scope and implementation
Sites that were part of an acquisition are included in the scope of our corporate environmental policy and associated environmental initiatives. Therefore, they may become 14001-certified and audited. This table shows our ISO 14001 certification KPIs.
| KPI | FY18 | FY19 | FY20 | FY21 | FY22 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| KPI: Number of Cisco sites with ISO 14001 certification | FY18: 32 | FY19: 32 | FY20: 31 | FY21: 30 | FY22: 30 |
We use our EMS process to identify environmental impacts and risks at each Cisco site and set relevant local and corporate level objectives. All ISO 14001-certified sites have at least one environmental aspect team that reports on environmental goals, initiatives, and metrics.
| Aspect teams | Global teams | Americas | EMEA3 | APJCI4 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aspect teams: Waste reduction and recycling | Global teams: | Americas: 6 | EMEA3: 7 | APJCI4: 9 | Total:22 |
| Aspect teams: E-scrap management1 | Global teams: √ | Americas: 12 | EMEA3: 10 | APJCI4: 2 | Total:24 |
| Aspect teams: Energy management | Global teams: √ | Americas: 0 | EMEA3: 2 | APJCI4: 9 | Total:11 |
| Aspect teams: Green Initiative/ Environmental awareness2 | Global teams: | Americas: 6 | EMEA3: 5 | APJCI4: 0 | Total:11 |
| Aspect teams: Total per region | Global teams: | Americas: 24 | EMEA3: 24 | APJCI4: 20 | Total:68 |
1 These teams have site-specific activities and goals but also support a corporate level/global goal.
2 Used at smaller sites, these teams typically include activities around employee engagement, energy management, e-scrap management, waste reduction and recycling, and local "green" activities.
3 Europe, Middle East, and Africa.
4 Asia Pacific, Japan, China, and India.
Cisco's corporate sustainability activities are included in our certified ISO 14001 EMS and are part of the internal and external audits we perform annually. We will continue to assess our ISO 14001 program for site expansion and alignment with acquisitions, business needs, and commitments. In fiscal 2022 we updated the environmental section of the supplier sustainability scorecard to require all Cisco CM and Strategy ODM supplier sites to have ISO 14001 or ISO 45001 certification. 18 of our 19 CM and Strategic ODM sites have obtained ISO 14001 certification, representing 95 percent coverage and 17 of the 19 facilities have obtained ISO 45001 certification, representing 90 percent coverage.
Our EMS aligns closely with our circular economy, GHG emissions, waste and energy management programs, and supports the management and data collection of our sustainability information. Internal EMS audits provide insight into how our environmental processes and commitments have been implemented and how well we are improving our EMS at our certified sites. The frequency of these audits depends on criteria such as site size, operational activities at the site, and the results of previous audits. As of the end of fiscal 2021, both our internal and external audits are fully virtual. As part of our ISO 14001 certification, we participate in annual audits conducted by a third-party registrar. These audits identify areas of improvement and performance while providing external validation and verification of our EMS processes and programs.
The environmental programs and aspect teams continue to regularly review their activities, metrics, and goals to ensure alignment with remote working and location-specific workplace return to office activities. We will continue evolve our ISO 14001 EMS to align with our new hybrid workplace.
A sampling of all environmental–related claims made in our annual Purpose Report are subject to a multiday, detailed, bottom-up audit conducted by our internal ISO 14001 audit team and part of the annual ISO 14001 internal audit plan. Verification is key to reporting valid data and helps us actively identify needed corrective actions. A sampling of the environmental claims made in our fiscal 2021 reporting were successfully audited and verified through Cisco's internal audit process. All environment-related claims in Cisco's 2022 ESG reporting cycle will be audited by our internal ISO 14001 audit team in fiscal 2022.
14001 requirements of EOL providers
Cisco's Global eScrap Management Aspect Test (SMAT) is responsible for setting objectives for all ISO 14001 Cisco offices, and align objectives with significant environmental aspects identified by Cisco's EMS and Environmental Aspect Management process. They drive Cisco's environmental performance, commitment to pollution prevention, and continual improvement. In fiscal 2019, the SMAT team strengthened our goal by lowering the objective percentage to 0.38 percent of material sent to landfill after value, recovery, reuse, and recycle processing. We recognize that Cisco has limited control over the material received at the recycler. However, we continue to work to reduce material sent to landfill and in fiscal 2023 are going to further lower our objective percentage to 0.15 percent.
Compliance with environmental regulations
Cisco complies with applicable environmental regulations and laws in the countries in which we operate.
Read about Cisco's position regarding relevant product-related Materials, Recycling, Battery & Packaging legislation under Materials (e.g., Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS), Registration, Evaluation, Authorization, and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH)) and Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE), Battery & Packaging Compliance.
For information regarding the homologation status for given Cisco products in certain countries, visit our self-service PAS (Product Approvals Status) Database.
Cisco has incurred no significant environmental fines—defined as more than US$10,000—in any of the last five years, nor have we been subject to nonmonetary sanctions for noncompliance with environmental laws and regulations. Cisco is not aware of any formal grievance filed about environmental impacts.