Our promise to a sustainable future, just for you.

Through an active supplier engagement program, we aim to reduce the embodied carbon within Direct materials we procure. With a 20% emissions reduction goal by 2030 vs 2024, we are taking initial steps there. Strategies involve decarbonization, product carbon footprint optimization and renewable energy allocation to our procured parts.

We are committed to achieving net-zero Scope 1 and 2 emissions (NZ) by 2032 across our production facilities, including chemicals, gases, fuels, refrigerants, and purchased energy, while targeting 100% renewable energy (RE) or carbon-free energy (CFE) by 2030. 4 of our 10 manufacturing locations have on-site solar on premises. Our strategy is to decarbonize our Scope 1 through consumption reduction, transition to lower Global Warming Potential (GWP) alternatives and enhance capture prior to release to the atmosphere. Beyond 2030, Residual emissions beyond these efforts, we seek to offset through carbon credits.

Water is a precious resource for our planet.  We have an absolute water withdrawals reduction goal of 20% by 2030 vs 2022.

Our manufacturing sites generate waste from the operations. We believe in diverting most of our waste away from landfill into more sustainable paths that includes cycling, composting, reuse, responsible incineration, and more. To that effect, we have a goal of diverting 95% of our operational waste away from landfill by 2030.

We aim to reduce downstream Scope 3 emissions per petabyte during the use phase by 50% by 2030 compared to 2020.

Western Digital launched a collaborative project where materials were collected from several Microsoft data centers located in the United States for material recovery. This multi-party pilot showcases a highly efficient, economically viable system that achieved an impressive approximately 90% recovery of elemental and rare earth materials that can be used by the U.S. supply chain.

The aggregated results from all processes are very promising, and demonstrate that advanced recovery can cut CO₂ emissions by up to 95% compared to virgin material production. Recovery also reduces dependency on environmentally damaging mining processes, which can involve high energy use, acid leaching, and radioactive waste.

Advanced chemical processes, combined with meticulous segregation of components, also allowed the system to recapture ~80% by mass of the feedstock turning potential waste into valuable assets.In a multi-party pilot program, Western Digital in collaboration with Microsoft, Critical Materials Recycling (CMR) and PedalPoint Recycling has taken a major step toward closing that loop. Together, the companies transformed ~50,000 pounds of shredded end-of-life HDDs, mounting caddies and other materials into critical high-value materials, all while significantly reducing environmental impact. This pioneering process of creating a new advanced sorting ecosystem with an eco-friendly non-acid process not only recaptures essential rare earth elements but also extracts metals like gold (Au), copper (Cu), aluminum (Al) and steel, feeding them back into the U.S. supply chain, supporting industries that rely on these resources—such as electric vehicles, wind turbines, and advanced electronics. When scaled worldwide, this new recycling process could return a lot of recovered rare earths to the U.S. supply pool, drastically reducing the need for virgin material mining detrimental to people and planet.³ Today, most primary production (>85%) of REEs occurs outside of the U.S.^{4, 5} and the current domestic recycling rate for REEs is very low (<10%)⁶.

We are always exploring and innovating new ways to reduce power consumption. That’s why, when we focused on improving HDD power efficiency, it resulted in an estimated 4,060,100 MWh¹² of product-level power savings during Fiscal year 2024.

On Earth Day 2020, we launched our Easy Recycle product take-back program in the US that enables customers to easily recycle old data storage devices from any manufacturer. This free program has recycled more than 38,000 devices¹¹ and diverted over 16 metric tons of waste from landfills.

Recycle and save today. Receive a 15% discount on a purchase of $50 or more on the Western Digital Store when you safely dispose of old hard drives, when you safely dispose of old hard drives with Easy Recycle¹⁴

We’re dedicated to saving greenspaces, one tree at a time. By reevaluating and redesigning our packaging, we’ve saved 12,000 trees. Additionally, most paperboard, plastic, and packaging used is recyclable where facilities exist.

At our Prachinburi, Thailand site - the use of automation, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and data analytics allowed us to improve energy efficiency in our chiller plant, saving 1,257 MWh¹⁰ in Fiscal Year 2024. This energy is equivalent to fully charge an electric car around 20,000 times.

What’s old is new again. We've made it a priority to create products that use recycled materials. The enclosure of drives such as the range of My Passport includes at least 50% post-consumer recycled plastic. Even the packaging incorporates greater than 50% post-consumer recycled pulp and is recyclable.

Chuck Graham, Microsoft VCP, Cloud Sourcing, Supply Chain, Sustainability and Security

“This is a tremendous effort by all parties involved. This pilot program has shown that a sustainable and economically viable end-of-life management for HDD’s is achievable”

“HDDs are vital to our data center infrastructure, and advancing a circular supply chain is acore focus for Microsoft. We're proud to be a part of this initiative with our partners, creating opportunities to reuse and recycle materials, reduce waste, and lower carbon impacts across the industry.”

Joint press release.

Tom Lograsso, Director of CMI 

"Scaling the ADR technology from lab to demonstration scale in just eight years is a testament to the incredible work by the team at CMR. This project is significant because HDD feedstock will continue to grow globally as AI continues to drive the demand for HDD data storage. CMI is proud to have supported the initial development, along with the Ames National Laboratory, to support this program’s growth and reach as a viable green approach to recover rare earth elements using environmentally friendly chemistry,” said Tom Lograsso, director of CMI.

Daniel Bina, CEO at CMR 

“The advancements and success achieved with rare earth recovery from HDDs can be directly applied to rare earth recovery from electric vehicles (EVs) and wind turbines.”

Brian Diesselhorst, CEO at PedalPoint Recycling 

“At PedalPoint Recycling, our mission is to secure and properly recover strategic metals from recycling. This is an exciting project that clearly demonstrates the positive impact companies can have on recycling when they partner and collaborate”.