Thales deploys an energy usage and efficiency plan

As part of its strategy for a low-carbon future launched in 2019, Thales is strengthening its approach to energy usage and efficiency. The Group is aiming for a 10% reduction in electricity and gas consumption in France by 2024 compared to 2019.

Thales is a low-energy intensive company compared to other industrial players. Indeed, the core of its energy consumption comes from laboratories and the Group is already committed to using energy responsibility for the long term.

The focus of the Group’s actions has been on electricity, which accounts for the majority of its energy mix (86% in 2021). In 2022, Thales achieved an important milestone with 100% of its electricity supply in France now coming from renewable sources (32% Worldwide).

In the current context of a global energy crisis, amplified in Europe by the war in Ukraine, Thales is elevating its ambition by deploying a new energy usage and efficiency plan.

In line with Thales’s technology-driven DNA, the plan includes four prongs: 

  1. Standardisation of good practices and raising awareness of eco-actions among employees;
  2. Self-production and energy efficiency;
  3. Real estate footprint optimisation;
  4. Strengthening of sustainable mobility initiatives.

© Thales

This plan is part of the Thales strategy for a low-carbon future, which aims to reduce operational CO₂ emissions by 35%* in absolute value between 2018 and 2023, 50% by 2030, and net-zero in 2040.

Outside of France, the Group will develop energy efficiency plans for its operations in ten other countries that account, with France, for more than 90% of its energy consumption: Australia, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Our energy saving initiatives are neither short-term nor temporary. They are part of our commitment to the protection of the environment, which is one of the three structuring axes of Thales's CSR policy. This is a long-term approach, with a gradual deployment throughout the Group. 

Sophie Le Pennec, Vice President, Thales Group Health, Safety and Environment 

THE PLAN FOR FRANCE IN DETAIL

Standardisation of best practices across the Group and raising awareness among employees

Adoption of four best practices across the Group

  • Regulation of temperatures of tertiary activity buildings between 19°C (heating) and 26°C (air conditioning)
  • Regulation of temperatures of data centres and data rooms 
  • Switching off lighting and neon signs, equipment and ventilation at night and outside working days, as well as in unoccupied areas, in strict compliance with on-site Safety and Security rules.
  • These best practices will be deployed across the Group and in compliance with local regulations where the Group is present.

Actions to raise awareness among employees:

  • Publication of a guide on good practices to adopt
  • A communication and education plan to reduce energy consumption in the workplace

Self-production and energy efficiency
No fewer than 100 self-production and energy efficiency projects are being rolled out in France.

Installation of parks of photovoltaic panels on suitable sites

  • Projects already rolled out in Toulouse and Cannes.
  • Projects planned for La Ciotat, Brest, Etrelles, Ymare and Gemenos in 2023. 
  • Additional projects under study could eventually make Thales's photovoltaic panel installations one of the largest industrial parks relying on such technology in France by 2026.

Heat recovery, especially in data centres

  • Projects already in place in Toulouse, Blagnac.
  • In Elancourt, heat recovery from data centres will allow us to heat all the buildings on the site and drastically reduce – and eventually end -- local gas consumption.

Local initiatives on all sites: optimisation of data centres, replacement of energy-consuming equipment, replacement of lighting with LEDs, installation of new types of equipment (biomass, heat recovery, heat pumps, etc.)

Real estate optimisation : the Connect project
The Connect project is an investment plan covering four expansion and transformation projects in the Paris region. It concerns the optimisation of the real estate footprint of 12 sites, representing 20% of employees in France. Underway since 2021 and with an end date scheduled for 2027, it aims, among other things, to improve the carbon footprint and energy management of the sites concerned.

Sustainable mobility Initiatives
Between 2023 and 2026, the entire Thales global vehicle fleet will switch to electric and/or hybrid engines**.

*Scope 1&2 and Scope 3 business travel
**On an exception basis, fuel-powered vehicles could be included in the policy based on each country’s energy mix.

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