In business activities

Operational ecology comprises the operational environmental management of the Swiss Life Group at its own locations as well as those it rents and the emissions arising from its business activities and its own employees.

Climate-related targets in the Swiss Life Group’s business operations

CO₂ emissions

Swiss Life aims to reduce its CO₂ emissions per FTE by 35% by the end of 2024 compared to 2019, primarily by cutting emissions from travel and obtaining electricity from sustainable sources. As part of its investment cycles, Swiss Life also intends to further reduce fossil fuel use for heating company buildings. These targets are also part of the Group-wide “Swiss Life 2024” programme.

Since 2022, Swiss Life has been supporting climate change mitigation projects by acquiring certificates in line with the measured, unavoidable CO₂ emissions from the company’s operational activities. To this end, Swiss Life focuses on projects in its core European markets (Switzerland, France and Germany) that contribute not only to reducing CO₂ but also to preserving biodiversity, for example through forest conservation, reafforestation and the production of biochar. Further information about these projects is available in the Swiss Life section of the First Climate website (www.firstclimate.com/id85083429). This offsetting has meant that our operational activity has been net zero since 2022.

Since 2021, all electricity used by Swiss Life has originated from renewable energy sources. By the end of 2024, Swiss Life wants to reduce total emissions per FTE by 35% compared to 2019. It is making good progress to this goal: emissions per FTE were reduced by 44% at the end of 2023 compared to 2019. The environmental indicators for 2023 were audited by an independent auditor (more on this in the “Report of the Independent Auditor” section). Swiss Life offsets these emissions by acquiring certificates in the amount of the measured, unavoidable CO₂ emissions, and its operations have been net zero since 2022.

CO₂ emissions are recorded in accordance with the internationally recognised standards of the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Protocol Corporate Standard. The science-based CO₂ equivalents used for determining these values cover all relevant greenhouse gases:

• Scope 1 emissions comprise fuel used to heat buildings and for the company’s own fleet of vehicles.
• Scope 2 emissions comprise consumption of purchased electricity and district heating at the business locations.
• Swiss Life currently has four Scope 3 emissions categories:
• Category 1, “Purchased Goods and Services”, comprises paper consumption and water use at the business locations. Other purchased services (such as server capacity) that are also relevant for Swiss Life are not yet included in this category.
• Category 3, “Fuel- and Energy-Related Activities”, comprises the upstream processes for the production of the purchased building energy that are not included in Scopes 1 and 2. The methodology of the International Energy Agency from 2017 was used to split the energy emission factors from Ecoinvent into Scopes 1, 2 and 3.
• Category 5, “Waste Generated in Operations”, comprises emissions resulting from the disposal of waste at the business locations.
• Category 6, “Business Travel”, comprises the kilometres employees travel for business by train, car or plane.

The other categories are either not relevant for Swiss Life or else the data available is not of sufficient quality. In addition to its ambition to steadily improve data quality, Swiss Life continuously reviews the scope of its assessments and potentially relevant emission categories and analyses suitable data collection methods. These include the currently unrecorded Scope 3 emissions from categories 7, “Commuting”, and 9, “Emissions from Transport and Distribution of Products”.

Due to acquisitions and the continuous review of the scope of application, projections and emission factors, Swiss Life is disclosing adjustments in its 2023 environmental indicators.

Swiss Life continuously reviews the data basis relating to the real estate used by Swiss Life. This includes checking the plausibility of extrapolations, emission factors, acquisitions and disposals of business activities.

The main changes are as follows:

• With the acquisition of fb research by Swiss Life Germany on 1 January 2023, an additional location in Hanover (85 FTE as at 31 December 2023) was integrated along with the corresponding environmental indicators.
• As a result of an internal review of the scope of application during the year under review, the Axenta location in Dättwil (46 FTE as at 31 December 2023) and a Swiss Life company building in Lausanne (57 FTE as at 31 December 2023) were added to Swiss Life Switzerland with effect from 1 January 2023. These were previously included in an extrapolation.
• As a result of an internal review of the scope of application during the year under review, the Principal & Prosper location in Edinburgh (47 FTE as at 31 December 2023) was added to Swiss Life International on 1 January 2023. This was previously included in an extrapolation.
• From 2023, Swiss Life is also including recycled waste as a share of total waste in its environmental indicators. The recycling waste is calculated based on the assumption that bio-waste, glass, paper, metal, printer cartridges, batteries, clothing and accessories, plastics and aluminium cans are recycled at the main Swiss Life locations in Switzerland, Germany and France.
• From 2023, Swiss Life is stating its “business travel” emissions in more detail and has added a new category, “Journeys by public transport: bus”.
• The emission factors in the scientific database Ecoinvent have been updated in accordance with the new version 3.10 dated 2023. Emission factors from Mobitool Version 3 have been used for electric and hybrid vehicles since the reporting year. Updating the emission factors increased total emissions by 5%.

In the year under review, Swiss Life further reduced building energy consumption compared to 2022 (–9% per FTE). This was due to expanded energy-saving measures at various locations, Moreover, no additional emergency fuel was purchased in the year under review. In addition to reducing building energy consumption, Swiss Life increased the share of renewable fuel sources in 2023 from 6% in the previous year to 17%. Travel activity at Swiss Life saw a year-on-year increase (+16% per FTE). One reason for the increase is that Swiss Life began, in the year under review, to consistently include incentive trips in this category. These relate to seminars organised by Swiss Life for groups of 20 or more participants and lasting more than one day. Compared to the baseline year 2019, business trips were reduced by 22% per FTE overall. In terms of paper consumption, Swiss Life posted a slight reduction compared to the previous year (–9% per FTE). In terms of water consumption (0% per FTE) and waste (–1% per FTE), there were no significant deviations from the previous year.

Further information can be found in the Sustainability Report, available at www.swisslife.com/sustainabilityreport (“Climate Change Mitigation and Operational Ecology” section).

Absolute environmental indicators

Relative environmental indicators per FTE