• Targets
• Results
• Managing sustainability at Sobeys
• Making sustainability visible and actionable
• Corporate governance
• Risk management
• GRI reporting
• Glossary

Targets

Targets

Our sustainability targets are grouped into:

1. Direct operations – the operation of our stores, distribution centres, and fleets that are directly controllable by us, which account for approximately 10-20% of a food retailer's cumulative environmental footprint; and
2. Supply chain – the environmental impact of sourcing, packaging and transporting the products we sell, which account for approximately 80-90% of a food retailer's cumulative environmental footprint.

Direct Operations Targets

Sobeys has established the carbon footprint of our direct operations using a Canadian grocery industry-developed tool that is compliant with the World Business Council for Sustainable Development/World Resources Institute (WBCSD/WRI) GHG Protocol (www.ghgprotocol.org). Using this tool, we can identify our high performing operations, use their performance to define our benchmarks, seek ways to improve the performance of other facilities and report on our progress. The metrics on which we're primarily focused include energy consumption, refrigerant usage and waste management/recycling.

Sobeys established two quantifiable environmental objectives to be met by December 31, 2013:

1. To reduce our Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions by 15%, measured by:
   
   
   • Retail stores: kilograms of CO2e per square foot
   • Distribution centres: kilograms of CO2e per 100 cases shipped
   • Fleets: kilograms of CO2e per 100 kilometres travelled


2. To reduce total waste production by 30%. This goal includes:
   
   
   • Waste diverted from landfill by our direct operations, measured by:
     • Retail stores: kilograms of waste to landfill per square foot
     • Distribution centres: kilograms of waste to landfill per 100 cases shipped
   • 50% reduction in plastic grocery bags distributed to customers, measured by the number of plastic bags per 1,000 customer transactions
   • 5% reduction in private label packaging weight, measured by the kilograms of packaging material per 1,000 units of product sold

Boundary and Scope

Sobeys direct operations targets apply to our corporately-owned stores, distribution centres and fleets. Measurement of our carbon footprint is of scope I and scope II emissions.

2008 Baseline Year

Sobeys has collected over four years of data from our stores, distribution centres and offices on our carbon footprint and waste diversion. After evaluating the volatility in the data year-to-year and the improving completeness of it each year, we determined 2008 to be our baseline year.

Sobeys' retail stores accounted for 84% of total GHG emissions in our 2008 baseline year. Our distribution centres accounted for 11% and fleets 5% of our total national carbon footprint.

Electricity consumption at 64.5% and refrigerant leaks at 26.5% account for the majority of our retail stores' baseline carbon footprint. The carbon footprint attributed to electricity consumption is determined by the energy source for electricity generation, which varies significantly by province. Québec's hydro electricity is very "clean" energy, so it has a low carbon footprint, while provinces with a larger proportion of generation by coal fired plants have much higher carbon footprints, or "emission grid factors". Therefore, while saving electricity is always a great cost-saving opportunity for us, in some provinces it has a much greater impact in reducing our attributed carbon footprint and saving associated costs than in others.

Progress Update Periods

The time periods in our progress updates include:

• Our baseline year, defined as the calendar year of 2008, which was the period used for the initial collection of data input into our Canadian grocery industry measurement tool
• Our Sobeys Inc. sustainability reporting period, defined as the fiscal year beginning and ending in early May, which aligns with our financial reporting periods

In this sustainability review, our progress updates compare our intensity-defined metrics from fiscal 2011, which ran from May 2010 to May 2011, to our 2008 baseline year, and tracked against our 2013 targets.