NEW YORK—Material Bank, the world’s largest marketplace for architectural, design, and construction materials, announced its commitment to The Climate Pledge. Material Bank has transformed the architecture and design industry by allowing members to search from more than 450+ brands on a single website, order samples until midnight ET, and receive all materials in a single box by 10:30 a.m. the next morning. Built with sustainability at its core, the platform reduces massive amounts of waste in the sampling process. By signing The Climate Pledge, the company takes its commitment to sustainability a step further, going beyond industry standards to place climate health and decarbonization as a top priority.
Co-founded by Amazon and Global Optimism in 2019, The Climate Pledge is a commitment by companies to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2040—a decade ahead of the Paris Agreement’s goal of 2050.
Signatories to The Climate Pledge agree to:
- Measure and report greenhouse gas emissions on a regular basis;
- Implement decarbonization strategies in line with the Paris Agreement through real business changes and innovations, including efficiency improvements, renewable energy, materials reductions, and other carbon emission elimination strategies; and
- Neutralize any remaining emissions with additional, quantifiable, real, permanent, and socially beneficial offsets to achieve net-zero annual carbon emissions by 2040.
“We are thrilled to be part of this incredibly important initiative which challenges companies to go beyond the status-quo and act now,” said Material Bank Founder & CEO, Adam I. Sandow. “The gravity of climate change is something we cannot ignore, and we hope our bold commitment to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2040 will inspire the larger design community to continue to reevaluate and innovate when it comes to environmental impact.”
In addition to signing the pledge, Material Bank also expresses its commitment to reducing Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 38 percent by 2030, from a 2021 baseline year, in line with the Science Based Targets initiative. In 2020, Material Bank launched an effort to offset 100 percent of the carbon emissions from all sample shipments and to date, has offset more than 2.6K metric tons of C02e. In the same year, the company also launched the Carbon Impact Program, a free corporate initiative supporting design firms on their sustainability specification journey. The program provides firms with custom search filters, sustainable sampling metrics, and powerful digital tools to quickly search and sample sustainable materials.
By aggregating material samples from hundreds of manufacturers into one patented package, Material Bank has eliminated more than 2.6 million packages from being shipped. The platform supports a more circular economy through initiatives like its sample reclamation program, which offers free return packaging so that samples may be returned for reuse. More than 50 percent of samples returned are placed back into redistribution and since launch, Material Bank has diverted 200,000+ pounds of samples from sanitary landfills.
