Mercedes F1 aims to 'become the world’s most sustainable professional sports team' by 2030

Mercedes are aiming to become the most sustainable sports team in the world by 2030, the Silver Arrows confirmed in their second annual sustainability report.

The report from Mercedes sheds light from the standpoint of their CO2 emissions while also encompassing their efforts in charity, diversity, equality, and inclusivity.

Excerpts from their report read as follows:

"The ambitious target to reduce our CO2 emissions by 50% by 2022, from a 2018 baseline, has been exceeded, and challenging new targets have been set to achieve a verified zero footprint by 2030. By 2026, we aim to reduce our Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 100 percent and our Scope 3 emissions by 50 percent. By 2030, we want to reduce our Scope 3 emissions by 75 percent and reduce carbon by 25 percent. We are taking significant action to address our biggest sources of emissions by becoming the first global sports team to invest in sustainable aviation fuel, an industry-leading approach to reducing our Scope 3 aviation footprint that will nearly halve the footprint of our race team's air travel."

The statement also revealed that Mercedes has made strides with regard to inclusivity and reducing gender disparity within their organization, further adding:

"A review of all new employees shows that 38 percent of our new team members in 2021 were from underrepresented groups; this year, by the end of June 2022, that number was 32 percent. The percentage of women in our workforce has increased from 12 percent to 15 percent, and the percentage of employees from ethnic minorities has increased from three percent to seven percent. While these numbers are not yet what we are aiming for, we are pleased that our positive actions under Accelerate 25 are having a measurable impact,"

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"We're putting our money where our mouth is" - Lewis Hamilton speaks on the impact of Mercedes' Ignite Partnership

Lewis Hamilton is proud of all the work being done by Mercedes to make F1 more inclusive as it moves forward in the future.

The Ignite Partnership with Lewis Hamilton is 'a not-for-profit partnership working to increase diversity and inclusion in British motorsport.'

Speaking to commemorate the first grants from their Ignite Partnership clearing at a press conference ahead of the 2022 F1 British GP earlier this season, the 37-year-old said:

“Very proud of the work that we are doing as a team. Basically, when I sat down with Toto [Wolff] a year ago I said that I don't want to just be a driver for the team anymore, I feel it’s important that we start looking to what we’re doing both inside, but also outside of the sport.”

Hamilton continued:

“And so part of the contract was commitment from them and commitment from myself financially to put into Ignite, and to work on how…With the work that I did with the Hamilton Commission, working on seeing how we can get more young girls involved in our sport, and just working on how we can, for example, one of the things that we’re working on is having 10 Black students given scholarships for motorsport. And not only that, once they graduate, have a role, either with us in our team, but also within the sport.”

Mercedes reiterated its commitment to using team resources 'to benefit those in need and share the passion for motorsport that drives us all'. The Silver Arrows have also raised almost £75,000 for their official team charity Alzheimer's Research UK and are aiming to get to £100,000 by year-end.