Pharma Report / Carbon

01: Introduction

02: Solvents

03: Carbon

04: Catalysis

05: Waste

06: Progress

01: Introduction

02: Solvents

03: Carbon

04: Catalysis

05: Waste

06: Progress

Greening Global Health

Carbon

New life cycle analyses and case studies help us understand the carbon footprint of the pharmaceutical industry. But to make bigger cuts in emissions, competitors will need to cooperate.

04: Catalysis

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04: Catalysis

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By the time a drug enters a pharmacy, it has moved through dozens of stages, from manufacturing to packaging to freight. And every step of the way comes with a cost measured in carbon. Researchers have estimated that the pharmaceutical industry emits 48.55 metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2-Eq) per million dollars of revenue through direct emissions and purchased energy. That is 55% more greenhouse gas per dollar than the automotive industry. The pharmaceutical industry and health-care systems account for 4.5% of annual global carbon emissions. While the industry is concerned about carbon emissions, the solutions are not simple. Pharmaceutical companies, which are typically fiercely competitive, are increasingly working together to overcome this challenge.

To understand why the pharmaceutical industry is carbon intensive, we must first understand the sources of carbon. Some of these emissions, known as Scope 1 emissions, come from furnaces and vehicles and are directly under a company’s control. Other emission sources are more indirect. Scope 2 emissions tally the environmental burden of purchased energy sources, such as electricity or steam. Scope 3 emissions account for all the materials purchased in a supply chain. Scope 1 and 2 may represent as little as 10% of a pharmaceutical company’s emissions, but they also offer many options to limit a carbon footprint. From R&D to operations, drugmakers can optimize their processes with synthetic routes that require fewer steps and materials.

The scope of emissions

A company’s carbon footprint refers to the total amount of greenhouse gases released through their activities. This environmental impact is often reported in terms of carbon dioxide equivalent, or CO2e. This incorporates the sum contributions of all greenhouse gases based on the amount of CO2 that would have the same expected warming potential over 100 years.

Carbon Footprint

Consider the small-molecule drug Lipitor (atorvastatin). In a life cycle analysis shared in 2014, Pfizer researchers identified key emission sources in the drug’s synthesis, the volume of nonactive ingredients, the packaging, and the freight. The company then decided to optimize their process to reduce emissions. They used green chemistry principles to produce atorvastatin with biocatalysts that used water as a solvent in room-temperature reactions. They also reduced nonactive compounds to create a smaller tablet, which they distributed in blister packs. This revised process reduced the carbon footprint of the medication by half, according to the company. Unfortunately, no standard process to reduce carbon emissions exists, especially since the drivers of carbon emissions vary between classes of drugs. The carbon footprint of biologics, for example, is driven by electricity, according to research from the sustainable health-care firm YewMaker. “The single biggest thing [pharmaceutical companies] should do is to switch over to renewable energy,” says Nazneen Rahman, founder of YewMaker and director of the Sustainable Medicines Partnership, a nonprofit collaboration to reduce pharmaceutical waste. “That’s an immediate lever for anyone who’s making those large molecules, because it’s very electricity intensive.”

Many of the largest pharmaceutical companies have reduced their direct emissions—and are setting ambitious goals for further emission reductions. Those producing small-molecule drugs are electrifying their manufacturing processes with renewable energy and improving designs related to solvents, which account for up to 90% of total process mass.

Decarbonization builds momentum

Many biologic therapies have major emissions associated with cleaning bioreactors for reuse. This has prompted some companies to adopt single-use technologies, which, counterintuitively, lower the carbon footprint by reducing upkeep and cleaning requirements. With efforts like these, Scope 1 and 2 greenhouse gas emissions have declined 10% annually since 2019, according to the 2025 The Carbon Impact of Biotech and Pharma report from My Green Lab. Encouraging signs indicate this trend will continue. Reducing carbon emissions does not negatively affect profits, and an increasing number of pharmaceutical companies are setting targets to reduce their emissions. “Last year’s [Carbon Impact] report, we had a little over 30% of companies that had set net-zero targets for Scope 1 and 2. Now it’s over 50%,” Connelly says. AstraZeneca has pledged to slash Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 98% by the end of 2026, in part by using renewable natural gas for all its US-based R&D and manufacturing by the end of the year. It and other pharmaceutical companies, such as Takeda and Novartis, have publicly reported climate impacts to the nonprofit Carbon Disclosure Project since 2010. But most pharmaceutical companies are not as forthcoming. Only 1 in 4 of the 100 largest global pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies have shared emissions data with the Carbon Disclosure Project. Among these transparent few, each company applies a different reporting methodology, which makes data difficult to compare. The hope, according to Connelly, is that instilling a culture of sustainability not only brings greener labs or more efficient operations but also evolves industry practices overall. A team that prioritizes sustainability in their own operations may also expect the same from their suppliers and contractors, opening a path to reduced Scope 3 emissions.

More than half of a pharmaceutical company’s carbon impacts are from indirect emissions from a company’s supply chain. Some companies have reduced their Scope 3 emissions by addressing the impacts of their cold chain and switching from air freight to sea freight. But the path for further reductions is not straightforward. My Green Lab estimates that Scope 3 emissions make up 75% of emissions for public pharmaceutical companies and 88% for private companies. In either case, these emissions come from decisions of companies up the supply chain. Industry leaders believe that reducing the pharmaceutical industry’s Scope 3 emissions requires collective action. Several related partnerships have emerged in recent years.

Collaborating on Scope 3 emissions

Leaders from major pharmaceutical companies have joined forces in these precompetitive collaborations. In November 2025, chief procurement officers from AstraZeneca, GSK, Novo Nordisk, Samsung Biologics, Sanofi, Roche, Novartis, and UCB published an open letter to suppliers, updating sustainability targets first conveyed in 2023. The goals include sourcing 80% renewable energy and reducing heat emissions by 20% by 2030. The companies asked that their vendors “source lower carbon and circular input materials, including sustainable feedstocks for solvents and plastics,” and that they adopt these standards for their suppliers down the chain as well. The hope is that these collaborations improve environmental reporting in the pharmaceutical industry. Better, more-accessible data should reveal emission hot spots in supply chains where companies can coordinate and direct their climate action. Scope 3 emissions will not be meaningfully cut without meaningful collaborations. “It’s a natural extension of this collaborative, precompetitive work... to now start to think about sustainability and environmental health issues,” Connelly says. “I think we’ve not only crossed the tipping point of ambition. We’re now crossing a tipping point of action.”

02: Solvents

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02: Solvents

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Name

Formula

CO2e

Carbon dioxide

CO2

Methane

CH4

1,2-difluoromethane

C2H4F2

140

Nitrous oxide

N2O

298

1,1,1,2-tetrafluoroethane

C2H2F4

1,430

On the other hand, the impacts of small-molecule processes depend more on a compound’s synthetic complexity and dose. “For small molecules, the quickest wins are in solvents: reduce how much you use, recover and reuse more, and move to greener alternatives,” Rahman added. Injectables and anesthetics have relatively large life cycle emissions compared with those of oral drugs due to their bulkier packaging and more complex manufacturing process. For example, the intravenous version of antibiotic ciprofloxacin used in hospitals has a footprint 60 times as great as that of the tablet version. Perhaps the most extreme outliers are asthma inhalers. Traditional inhalers use hydrofluorocarbon propellants, such as 1,1,1,2-tetrafluoroethane. The combined greenhouse impact of inhaler use in the US exceeds that of roughly half a million cars. Major pharmaceutical companies such as GSK have committed to replacing traditional inhalers with low-carbon formulations. “Frankly, that was some relatively low-hanging fruit that really needed to be addressed right away,” James Connelly, CEO of My Green Lab, a nonprofit that promotes sustainable scientific practices, says of inhaler innovations. “Companies have been very aggressive at tackling them.” Decarbonizing otherwise has been a persistent challenge, but pharmaceutical companies are finding solutions.

For small molecules, the quickest wins are in solvents: reduce how much you use, recover and reuse more, and move to greener alternatives.

Nazneen Rahman, Founder of YewMaker and director of the Sustainable Medicines Partnership

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In 2021, this program from France-based Schneider Electric launched to electrify the pharmaceutical industry’s supply chain by helping small suppliers access renewable electricity markets previously available only to large companies.

Energize

In 2023, My Green Lab launched this collaboration between pharmaceutical companies and suppliers to promote lab sustainability within outsourced research supply chains.

Converge

This public-private partnership with the World Health Organization strives to make global health-care systems net zero in carbon emissions. Recently, the SMI task force and the UK’s national standards body published the first global standard for measuring the environmental impact of pharmaceuticals.

Sustainable Markets Initiative (SMI)

This partnership between pharmaceutical firms and suppliers is led by supply chain data company Secaro, which intends to address unreliable environmental data about emissions along the supply chain.

Activate

01: Introduction

02: Solvents

03: Carbon

04: Catalysis

05: Waste

06: Progress

Steps in synthesis: 12 Solvent usage: 137 kg/kg API Emission Factor: 496 CO2-Eq/kg API Application: tuberculosis References: Saga, Y.; Motoki, R.; Makino, S.; Shimizu, Y.; Kanai, M.; Shibasaki, M. Catalytic asymmetric synthesis of R207910. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2010, 132, 7905, DOI: 10.1021/ja103183rUnitaid. From Milligrams to Megatons: A climate and nature assessment of ten key health products, Unitaid, 2023 Link

Bedaquiline

Steps in synthesis: 5 Solvent usage: 75 kg/kg API Emission Factor: 188 CO2-Eq/kg API Application: antiretroviral (HIV/AIDS) References: Snead, D. R.; McQuade, D. T.; Ahmad, S.; Krack, R.; Stringham, R. W.; Burns, J. M.; Abdiaj, I.; Gopalsamuthiram, V.; Nelson, R. C.; Gupton, B. F. An Economical Route to Lamivudine Featuring a Novel Strategy for Stereospecific Assembly. Org. Process Res. Dev. 2020, 24 (6), 1194– 1198, DOI: 10.1021/acs.oprd.0c00083 Unitaid. From Milligrams to Megatons: A climate and nature assessment of ten key health products, Unitaid, 2023 Link

Lamivudine

Steps in synthesis: 5 Solvent usage: 6 kg/kg API Emission Factor: 79 CO2-Eq/kg API Application: antimalarial References: Beutler, U.; Fuenfschilling, P. C.; Steinkemper, A. An Improved Manufacturing Process for the Antimalaria Drug Coartem. Part II. Org. Process Res. Dev. 2007, 11 (3), 341–345. DOI: 10.1021/op060244pUnitaid. From Milligrams to Megatons: A climate and nature assessment of ten key health products, Unitaid, 2023 Link

Lumefantrine

Steps in synthesis: 7 Solvent usage: 10 kg/kg API Emission Factor: 174 CO2-Eq/kg API Application: antibiotic References: Russell, G. G.; Jamison, T. F. Seven-Step Continuous Flow Synthesis of Linezolid Without Intermediate Purification. Angewante Chemie. 2019, 131 (23), 7760-7763. DOI: 10.1002/ange.201901814Unitaid. From Milligrams to Megatons: A climate and nature assessment of ten key health products, Unitaid, 2023 Link

Linezolid

Steps in synthesis: 4 Solvent usage: 317 kg/kg API Emission Factor: 572 CO2-Eq/kg API Application: antiretroviral (HIV/AIDS) References: Wang, X. H.; Chen, S.; Cui, H. Q.; He, Y. Q.; Zhao, C. K. Three-step synthetic procedure to prepare dolutegravir, cabotegravir, and bictegravir. Green Chem. Lett. Rev. 2022, 15, 312– 319, DOI: 10.1080/17518253.2022.2057200Unitaid. From Milligrams to Megatons: A climate and nature assessment of ten key health products, Unitaid, 2023 Link

Cabotegravir

Steps in synthesis: 9 Solvent usage: 250 kg/kg API Emission Factor: 825 CO2-Eq/kg API Application: reduces bleeding after childbirth References:Unitaid. From Milligrams to Megatons: A climate and nature assessment of ten key health products, Unitaid, 2023 Link

Carbetocin

Carbon impact of selected pharmaceuticals

Medicine and Emissions

01: Introduction

02: Solvents

03: Carbon

04: Catalysis

05: Waste

06: Progress