“The environmental transition is a collective effort”

François Gemenne, what led you to focus on climate change?
 

François Gemenne — I’m primarily a professor and researcher at HEC Paris, where I also head the Master’s program in Sustainability and Social Innovation. Alongside that, I volunteer with the Fondation pour la Nature et l’Homme and the IPCC. I became interested in environmental issues through my work on climate justice. It seemed profoundly unfair to me that the effects of climate change we experience aren’t directly related to our own emissions. Part of what happens to us depends on emissions from the past and emissions produced by others.

Nobody is perfect, but that shouldn’t stop us from being proactive and making progress.

So was your interest mainly driven by your sense of what is ethically right?
 

F.G. — Yes. I initially worked with people displaced by the effects of climate change, before moving on to climate-related conflict and security. I then began looking at adaptation and how societies can make the transition. Whatever the issue, we’re still responsible for how our actions affect other people.

How does your research shape your teaching?
 

F.G — My research and teaching are closely connected, for example looking at environmental geopolitics, demographics, and climate change, and how the effects of climate change are altering where people can live and how populations are distributed geographically. For me, teaching and research need to inform each other. Teaching makes you approach questions differently, which in turn feeds into research. The aim is to share knowledge more widely and help people outside the research community understand and actively engage with these issues.

What role can a company like Orange play in the environmental transition?
 

F.G — The transition is a collective effort. What Orange does matters both for the company itself, and also because it can encourage other businesses and the wider public to do something.

Elizabeth Tchoungui, what are the main ways Orange can contribute to the environmental transition today?
 

Elizabeth Tchoungui - I see three complementary areas where we can make a difference. First, reducing our own impact. We’re aiming to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 45% by 2030 and reach Net Zero by 2040. That means making meaningful progress across our networks, buildings, equipment, and our entire value chain.
Second, making our infrastructure more resilient to the effects of climate change that we’re already seeing. We’ve begun mapping climate risks in 11 countries so we can identify vulnerabilities more clearly and anticipate impacts over different time horizons. Finally, we can use our capacity for innovation and our presence as a consumer telecom operator in 26 countries to help our customers, suppliers, and partners take action too. This is crucial: our responsibility doesn’t end with our own footprint. We also need to ask how our technologies, services, and choices can help others accelerate their own transition.

Our responsibility doesn’t end with our own footprint.

François, why do you think Orange is particularly well placed to make a difference?
 

F.G — There are at least three reasons. First, Orange is a very well-known brand. A company with this level of visibility can really help shape how people see the role of business in the transition if it can demonstrate it is creating positive change. Second, Orange operates in telecoms, a sector that plays an increasingly important part in everyday life. Networks are also essential for connecting people and therefore for social cohesion and resilience. Finally, Orange is a multinational company with a presence in many countries, so its ability to make a difference extends well beyond France. 
 

You prefer to talk about encouraging others rather than setting an example. Why? 
 

F.G — Because nobody is perfect, and you can always find something to criticize in a company. But showing what you’re doing can show to others that progress is possible, that they can move forward too, and that they’re not alone. That matters because one of the biggest reasons people and businesses feel powerless is the sense that they are acting alone.
 

Elizabeth Tchoungui, how can a company like Orange encourage its employees, suppliers, customers, and partners to be more proactive? 
 

E.T - It starts with leading by example, above all by helping others to be more proactive. A company can’t ask its ecosystem to change if it isn’t changing its own practices. But it can’t make progress alone either.
For our employees, that means training and making CSR part of people’s day-to-day roles. More than 60,000 employees have learned about CSR issues through our CSR Visa. With suppliers, it means changing our purchasing criteria, working across the entire value chain, and helping our partners make progress on their own transition. And for customers, we need to offer services and ways of using technology that combine innovation and performance with greater efficiency.
People are more likely to act when they can see what they themselves can do and that others are making progress too. That is the collective momentum we need to create.

What are the main obstacles businesses face when making the environmental transition? 
 

F.G — The first is obviously cost. Some environmental commitments require investment and can raise concerns about losing competitiveness. This is particularly sensitive in some industrial sectors, but it also affects services.
 

How can a company balance the investment needed for the transition with its economic and operational priorities? 
 

E.T - We need to stop treating CSR and performance as opposing goals. In many cases, the same decisions can support both. Reducing the energy used by our networks cuts our environmental footprint while helping us manage costs over the long term. Similarly, developing circular-economy models or extending the life of our equipment can reduce our use of resources while changing the way we operate.
The transition needs to be built into business decisions, investment, and innovation from the outset, rather than treated as an add-on later on. CSR shouldn’t be an extra cost added to the business. It should help shape business decisions and make the company more resilient over time.

You also identify fear of being judged as an obstacle.  
 

F.G — Yes. Some companies are reluctant to talk about what they’re doing because they fear people will say it isn’t good enough, ambitious enough, or fast enough. We have to accept that none of us is perfect. That shouldn’t stop us from being proactive or communicating what we’re doing.

So how do we stop the transition from feeling like a burden?  
 

F.G — The environmental transition is still sometimes presented as a burden that everyone has to shoulder. We need to turn it into something people want to be part of. When people feel others aren’t doing their share, there’s a temptation to become a “free rider”: why should I act if others don’t? But if the transition becomes a project we actively choose to join, our own involvement no longer depends entirely on what everyone else is doing.
 

Is this idea of a shared project also important for engaging employees?
 

E.T - Absolutely. The transition can’t feel like a succession of new restrictions or regulations. Everyone needs to understand how they can contribute and, above all, what it means in practical terms for their own role.
At Orange, that means helping our employees understand the issues and helping them do something about it. More than 23,000 employees have taken part in the “Fresque du Climat” since 2023, which is one example of how we’re building a shared understanding. But awareness is only the starting point. We then need to help people turn that understanding into everyday decisions, projects, and ways of working.
We also need to show the results and share initiatives that work. When people understand why something matters and have the ability to act, CSR becomes something that involves everybody not just the experts.

How can a company make its environmental action credible to the public? 
 

F.G — The first thing is to show where you started. A transition is a process of change. If you don’t show your starting point, you leave yourself more open to accusations of greenwashing. You then need to show where you want to go and how far you’ve got. 
 

What role does transparency play?
 

F.G — It’s essential. You need to be able to talk about obstacles, difficulties, delays, and even things that haven’t worked. Many companies communicate their targets; some also communicate their results, which is already an improvement. But credibility comes above all from showing the full journey: where you started, where you are now, and how things are changing.

How can a company like Orange make that progress clear and understandable, particularly when it hasn’t yet met all its targets? 
 

E.T - By showing both the journey and the evidence. We need to say where we started, where we want to go, and where we actually are today. That also means being open about the complexity involved, including when things don’t go according to plan.
The transition isn’t a straight line. Some issues are particularly complex, especially when they involve our value chain or depend on changes beyond the company itself. Trust can’t simply be claimed; it has to be earned through evidence.
That’s why we need to talk about our progress as well as the difficulties we encounter, where we still need to move faster, and what we plan to do about it. Credibility doesn’t come from promising a perfect journey. It comes from being clear about where we are and showing the changes step by step.

Should companies also talk about what the transition costs?
 

F.G — Yes, of course. Transparency also means being able to say what changes have cost, what trade-offs they involve, and what room there is to maneuver. That helps people understand the approach and makes it more credible.

How can collaboration between businesses, governments, local authorities, and society at large accelerate the transition? 
 

F.G — I think we made a mistake by placing so much of the responsibility for the transition on governments. The Paris Agreement was largely based on the idea that governments would act together toward a common goal. But if you look at governments around the world today, you can also see significant movement coming from businesses, local authorities, and communities. So we could imagine coalitions bringing together Orange and a country or municipality around a specific project. Take climate adaptation: early-warning systems are essential. In some areas, Orange could work with local authorities to set up SMS alerts for local communities. That’s a very practical example of combining a company’s expertise with the needs of a particular place.

Is this kind of local collaboration already part of how Orange sees its role in the environmental transition? 
 

E.T - Yes, and it will become increasingly important. The effects of climate change are highly local. A flood, wildfire, storm, or heat wave will have different consequences depending on where it happens. Resilience must be built with the people who know these places and areas and work in them every day.
We’re working to make our own infrastructure more resilient, but we can also use our expertise to support local authorities and organizations. Our networks are essential infrastructure in a crisis. Through SafetyCase, for example, we’re working on the ability to restore communications within 30 minutes.
This shows that our role goes beyond reducing our own environmental footprint. We play a vital role in keeping communications running, enabling essential services to continue operating, and helping to share the right information to strengthen local resilience in crisis situations.
 

Can this kind of collaboration also extend to digital infrastructure?
 

F.G — Yes. I’m thinking about the growth of data centers and AI. Energy providers and telecom operators need to work together on questions such as how to make data centers as energy efficient as possible and how to power them with low-carbon electricity. These are exactly the kinds of challenges that require collaboration across sectors.

As AI and digital services grow, how can we meet rising infrastructure needs while improving efficiency and reducing carbon emissions?
 

E.T - This will be one of the major challenges of the next few years. The growth of AI will increase demand for computing capacity and energy, and we need to take that very seriously. It means continuing to reduce the environmental footprint of our own infrastructure by improving its energy efficiency, power supply, and optimization.
But there’s another side to this. Digital technology and AI can also help optimize resources, networks, energy use, and certain activities, reducing the impact of other sectors.
So it isn’t a question of choosing between innovation and efficiency. We need innovation itself to help us use resources more efficiently. That changes the way we look at the issue: we need to consider both the footprint of our technologies and their potential to reduce the footprint of the wider economy.

What would a company that had successfully completed its environmental transition look like to you?
 

F.G — For me, a company has truly succeeded in its transition when it has brought other businesses with it and made a positive contribution to the ecosystem around it. It has helped its competitors, suppliers, or customers make their own transition too. Companies often think about the transition within the boundaries of their own business. I think the bigger question is how they can help others make progress as well.

What would be the key measure of that success? 
 

F.G — The key question is: what does the company enable others to do that they might not have done on their own? That takes us to the heart of CSR: what role does a company play in society beyond generating profit for itself?

How can a company measure this wider impact on its ecosystem? What shows that it isn’t just changing its own practices, but genuinely helping others make progress too? 
 

E.T - It’s certainly harder to measure than our own footprint. But there are concrete indicators we can look at: the number of suppliers committed to reducing carbon emissions, the proportion of our purchasing that includes environmental and social criteria, or the solutions that help our customers reduce their own impact.
We’ve also set a target to increase our purchasing from the social economy by 4%, because the choices we make about who we work with can also encourage change across our ecosystem.
But I would ask a simpler question: what can Orange help its customers, suppliers, or local communities do today that would have been more difficult for them to do alone? That is part of our impact too. And perhaps that is the clearest measure of a collective effort: when a company’s actions go beyond its own results and help others make further progress.

Can the same principle apply to employees and customers? 
 

F.G — Absolutely, particularly in B2C companies like Orange. When an employee can say, “I’m going to make changes at home too because I don’t want a disconnect between what I do at work and what I do in my personal life,” the company is helping create that consistency. A company is also a place where people can act together. In an increasingly fragmented society, that can become an important role.

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