Virgin Mobile achieves carbon neutrality across the UAE, paving the way for a greener future

Virgin Mobile has achieved carbon neutrality across the UAE, paving the way for a greener future. Virgin Mobile UAE, a division of Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company (EITC), achieves net zero carbon emissions this year through investments in a variety of business and community projects, including a United Nations-certified offsetting initiative in Dubai and a tree-planting initiative in the United Kingdom. As a community collaborator and innovation pioneer, the strategy chosen has been led by a collaboration with Dubai Carbon, which sees Virgin Mobile UAE continue to provide game-changing initiatives for its consumers, not only to make mobile better, but also greener.

Virgin Mobile UAE’s overall emissions across all aspects of its business were examined by the Dubai Carbon Centre of Excellence. The emissions calculations were then used to develop and implement a variety of sustainable processes for Virgin Mobile UAE’s overall emissions reduction, including new ways of working related to business travel, material reduction and reuse, energy efficiency, and sustainability awareness and education initiatives.

Virgin Mobile UAE has implemented a variety of community relationships and investments in addition to commercial procedures. This includes a contribution to the Middle East’s first landfill gas (LFG)-to-energy project, in Al Qusais, Dubai. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has certified this project, which is led by Green Energy Solutions & Sustainability LLC (GESS) and fits Virgin Mobile UAE’s drive for innovation. GESS specialises on waste management in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), particularly landfill gas project development, which converts waste gas into renewable energy.

Virgin Mobile UAE is also testing biodegradable SIM cards to replace the present PVC plastic cards, allowing the company to become completely single-use and plastic-free.

Rob Beswick, Managing Director for Virgin Mobile UAE commented, “We believe it’s our responsibility to achieve carbon neutrality, and we are all extremely proud at Virgin Mobile of this first step, especially as we are actively supporting local UAE projects that directly impact our community and our customers. We believe our customers want the brands that they use to drive a sustainable future. Now that we have achieved neutrality, the next step is to continue to innovate and push the boundaries, bringing new solutions that can take us into carbon negative territory. We want to enable our team and our customers to join us on this journey, which is why we are investing in the research and development of a bio-degradable sim card and will launch an innovative digital app feature that allows our customers to easily offset their mobile carbon footprint soon. As an innovative and customer-first brand, this is exactly the type of pioneering action we want to take – to not only make mobile better, but to contribute to a sustainable future for all.”