Ikea Buys Up 25% of German Offshore Wind Farm

The Swedish furniture giant keeps ploughing ahead.

Yeas ago, Ikea bought a 12MW wind farm, and I remember thinking that this could mark a new front in the push for corporate environmental responsibility, shifting from indirect and sometimes murky 'carbon offsets' to direct ownership of large-scale renewables. Since then, everyone from Mars to Google has gotten serious about investing in renewables.

Fast forward eight years or so, and Reuters reports that Ikea has just bought up 25% of a whopping 402MW offshore wind farm, putting it well on track to meet its 2020 goal of producing more renewables energy than the company actually consumes.

This is an exciting step forward and comes hot on the heels of Ikea pushing several other ambitious sustainability efforts, including reducing meat sales and banning single-use plastics, 100% electric deliveries in key cities (with more to come soon), and cutting back on food waste too. Encouragingly, the Swedish furniture manufacturer is also taking a step back from its famous affordable-but-disposable approach to design, instead focusing on reuse, repair and longevity.

I'm sure there are plenty of folks who will still rag on Ikea. Indeed, we ourselves are currently in the process of ripping out some Ikea cabinets in favor of some real wood ones that will actually last more than 15 years. But if I were to think up a corporate environmental strategy that was scaled to meet the challenges ahead of us, Ikea's is pretty close to where I'd start — moving past the idea of being 'less bad' and 'taking responsibility', and toward the idea of wielding a company's power, influence, and assets to change societal norms instead.