Telekom CR-Report: Sustainability Strengthens Business and Resilience

• Climate neutrality achieved across the Group’s own operations
• Greater efficiency and lower emissions through technology and digitalization
• Strengthening digital inclusion as a contribution to sustainable transformation

Deutsche Telekom has consistently embedded sustainable business practices across all ESG dimensions into its core business. ESG stands for Environmental, Social, and Governance. As a leading digital telecommunications company, the Group combines technological innovation with social and environmental responsibility.

Deutsche Telekom recently reached an important milestone in its climate strategy: since the end of 2025, the Group’s own operations have been carbon neutral on a net basis. Sustainable business practices are firmly established as an integral part of value creation and corporate strategy: “Sustainability is not a parallel agenda alongside our core business. In times of multiple crises, we see sustainability as a contribution to strengthening long-term relevance, resilience, and entrepreneurial freedom to act,” says Robert Metzke, Vice President Group Corporate Responsibility, Deutsche Telekom AG.

Compared with 2017, the Group has reduced its Scope 1 and 2 emissions by more than 94 percent. The remaining six percent are offset through high-quality carbon removal projects. The company is also making significant progress across its entire value chain: emissions (Scope 1–3) declined by 38 percent compared with 2020. Deutsche Telekom is therefore on track to achieve its interim target of a 55 percent reduction by 2030, validated by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). The Climate Transition Plan outlines the path to climate neutrality across the entire value chain by 2040.

Despite rapidly increasing data traffic, Telekom continues to improve its energy efficiency. The goal is to keep energy consumption at least stable by 2027 compared with 2023 levels (excluding T-Mobile US). In 2025, energy intensity fell by around 16 percent to 48 kWh per terabyte. This is based on investments in modern infrastructure, intelligent control systems, and targeted efficiency measures. In mobile communications, so-called power-saving functions automatically reduce energy consumption during periods of low utilization. At the same time, outdated technologies are being systematically phased out. Data centers are also becoming more efficient: the average global PUE value (“Power Usage Effectiveness”) was 1.53. The new AI factory in Munich even achieves values below 1.2.

Renewable energy is a key lever for reducing emissions. Since 2021, Telekom has sourced 100 percent green electricity from renewable sources across the Group. By the end of 2025, Telekom procured 31.7 percent of this sustainable electricity through long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs) with energy suppliers. These agreements secure stable energy prices over many years while also supporting the expansion of new solar and wind farms. The company’s own renewable energy production increased significantly to 13.9 GWh. This corresponds to the annual electricity consumption of approximately 4,000 to 4,500 households. In addition, Telekom is investing in large-scale battery storage systems with a total capacity of 16 MW. These systems store surplus green electricity and feed it back into the grid when weather-related generation declines. In doing so, they contribute to grid stability and security of supply.

A new focus of the CR Report is on concrete applications of artificial intelligence in Telekom’s core business. These examples show how the digital technologies developed and deployed by Telekom make measurable contributions to sustainability.

• Energy efficiency: AI dynamically controls networks and buildings, with savings potential of up to 20 percent in CO₂ emissions.
• Data centers: AI-based cooling management unlocks efficiency gains of up to 33 percent.
• Industry and logistics: Digital platforms designed by Telekom, such as “Cloud4Log,” enable paperless exchange of transport documents and save up to 800,000 sheets of paper annually.
• Healthcare: Telekom supports partners in developing AI-based applications to assist medical diagnostics.
• Security: Telekom uses AI to detect cyberattacks in real time across billions of analyzed data points every day.

This demonstrates that AI is not only a driver of growth, but can also be a lever for climate protection and social value creation. At the same time, Telekom consistently pursues the “Greening of AI” approach – for example through energy-efficient infrastructure, optimized AI models, and implementation of its Green AI Principles.

Telekom’s digital solutions enable significant CO₂ savings for customers. In Germany, the enablement factor reached 6.09 in 2025. This means that Telekom products can help save more than six times the emissions generated by the company’s own operations.

This corresponds to a potential climate impact of around 23.5 million metric tons of CO₂e.

The transformation of the vehicle fleet is also showing results:

• Around 14,000 metric tons of CO₂ were saved.
• 40 percent of company vehicles are already electric.
• The share of electric drivetrains in service vehicles increased to 10 percent.
• Fuel consumption declined overall by around 11 percent.

Worldwide, Telekom operates more than 2,700 charging points.

By 2030, Telekom aims to make its IT, network technology, and devices almost fully circular.

With the Telco Circularity Score (TCS), the company is also introducing its own management tool that makes circularity measurable and manageable across the entire lifecycle – from product design to end-of-life. In the future, the TCS could potentially serve as an industry standard.

In 2025, around 700,000 mobile devices and 4.9 million fixed-network devices were taken back in Germany and Europe. A large proportion was refurbished and reused. In addition, around 1,200 metric tons of copper were recovered from legacy infrastructure in Germany. Including T-Mobile US, around 10.5 million mobile devices were taken back across the Group.

In addition to environmental protection, Telekom specifically focuses on social participation and an inclusive digital society. In 2025, the Group invested around one billion euros in social initiatives. Approximately 41 million people directly benefited from these activities.

Closely linked to its core business, Telekom places a strong emphasis on digital inclusion. This includes special tariff offerings for educational institutions, programs such as “Telekom@School,” and initiatives promoting media literacy for children, parents, and senior citizens. With offerings such as education flat rates, students gain access to digital learning content, while training and information programs strengthen the safe use of digital technologies. In addition, the company provided more than 1.8 million euros in disaster relief funding, while employees contributed over 215,000 volunteer hours.

Transparency, integrity, and responsible conduct form the foundation of corporate governance at Telekom.

Throughout the supply chain, the company advocates for the protection of people and the environment. At the same time, data privacy and IT security remain core components of the brand identity.

The 2025 CR Report shows that, for Telekom, sustainability is not only a responsibility, but also a key competitive advantage in the digital age.

German: https://bericht.telekom.com/cr-bericht/2025/
English: https://report.telekom.com/cr-report/2025/

The sustainability statement can be found in the Deutsche Telekom 2025 Annual Report:

German: Deutsche Telekom Geschäftsbericht 2025
English: Deutsche Telekom Annual Report 2025

About Deutsche Telekom: Deutsche Telekom Group profile