CATL Achieves 2025 Core Operation Carbon Neutrality Target, Sets Path to 2035 Value-Chain Goal
CATL announced that it has achieved its 2025 target of carbon neutrality across its core operations, with all 20 of its battery manufacturing plants certified as carbon neutral. The company has now set out a roadmap to extend carbon neutrality across its wider value chain by 2035.
The battery manufacturer said the milestone represents a shift in its approach to decarbonization, with reducing emissions increasingly integrated into manufacturing, procurement, product development and supply-chain strategy.
In 2025, zero-carbon electricity accounted for 100% of electricity consumption across CATL’s core operations. The company has consumed more than 18 billion kWh of zero-carbon electricity cumulatively since 2023.
CATL also reported that energy consumption per unit of product at its battery manufacturing bases has fallen 28% compared with 2022, while carbon-emission intensity has declined by approximately 77% over the same period.
Between 2023 and 2025, CATL said it achieved a cumulative reduction of more than 10 million tonnes of CO₂ equivalent.
To measure and manage emissions, CATL developed its CATL Carbon Chain Management System (CCMS) in 2022. The system monitors carbon emissions across manufacturing operations and core upstream suppliers and has generated more than 1,000 product and raw-material models.
The company said the system allows carbon-reduction measures to be integrated into areas including manufacturing processes, equipment optimisation, battery design, renewable-energy consumption, raw-material procurement and recycling.
CATL’s next target is substantially broader. The company estimates that more than 80% of emissions associated with its products’ lifecycle originate in the supply chain, with total value-chain emissions exceeding five times those generated by its core operations.
As a result, CATL is targeting full value-chain carbon neutrality by 2035, with efforts extending beyond its own factories to raw-material suppliers, logistics providers and recycling operations.
A major part of the strategy will involve improving emissions data from suppliers. CATL has already established baseline carbon data for more than 100 core Tier 1 suppliers and intends to progressively achieve full data coverage across key upstream activities.
From 2027, CATL’s new Green Procurement Guidelines will require suppliers to provide product carbon-footprint information. Renewable electricity use and energy efficiency will also become part of supplier evaluations, with suppliers demonstrating stronger low-carbon performance potentially receiving preferential consideration for orders and longer-term agreements.
CATL plans to focus its value-chain decarbonization programme on four main areas: material and process innovation, material manufacturing, green logistics and battery recycling.
In materials, the company is pursuing lower-carbon inputs and process improvements, including lower-carbon materials for battery anodes. For upstream manufacturing, CATL has launched a green-power coverage plan targeting 100% green electricity usage across its value chain by 2035.
The company is also working toward zero-carbon logistics across its industrial chain, while its recycling business, Brunp Recycling, is being used to expand CATL’s global battery recycling network.
To accelerate progress among suppliers, CATL will launch a Zero-Carbon Supply Chain Empowerment Initiative, initially working with 30 core suppliers on joint decarbonization projects.
CATL Chairman and CEO Robin Zeng said the company intends to use its own industrial experience to demonstrate how carbon neutrality can be implemented across the battery industry and to work with partners on broader industry standards.
The announcement therefore marks two distinct stages in CATL’s decarbonization strategy: the company has completed its 2025 target for carbon-neutral core operations, while the much larger challenge is now to reduce emissions throughout the battery value chain by 2035.
With most lifecycle emissions occurring upstream rather than inside CATL’s own factories, the success of the next phase will depend heavily on supplier data, renewable electricity adoption, lower-carbon materials, logistics and battery recycling.
