Western Digital (WD) is pursuing an energy strategy aimed at sustainability as demand for AI storage accelerates. WD said on April 23 it published its FY2025 sustainability report outlining the plan.

As data generation and storage volumes rise with expanding AI systems, storage infrastructure is becoming more energy-intensive. WD said the report includes progress on improving energy efficiency per terabyte and cutting carbon. WD is a storage infrastructure company listed on the Nasdaq (WDC) and works as a strategic partner to major global cloud operators.

In energy, WD said it now operates all 5 manufacturing sites on 100 percent carbon-free energy and lifted the share of renewable energy across its global manufacturing sites to 66 percent. WD said it aims to transition all manufacturing sites to carbon-free energy by fiscal 2030. It said emissions intensity per petabyte in the product-use phase fell 31 percent from fiscal 2020. In the supply chain, WD said it expanded its Scope 3 decarbonisation targets and set a new goal, as of fiscal 2024, to cut direct materials-related emissions 20 percent by fiscal 2030.

In the circular economy segment, WD said it achieved a 36 to 38 percent share of recycled materials in enterprise HDD products in fiscal 2025 and a 74 percent share of recycled materials in packaging. It said this already exceeds its fiscal 2030 target of 72 percent for packaging. WD said it also set a new goal to raise the share of recycled materials in products to 43 percent by fiscal 2030.

In rare-earth recovery, WD said it pursued the first pilot programme in the United States. WD said it ran a programme with Microsoft, Critical Materials Recycling and PedalPoint to recover rare earths from used HDDs, achieving a 90 percent recovery rate at the pilot stage. The programme was selected as a winner in the environmental impact category of the Environment+Energy Leader Awards.

On external recognition, WD said it received an "A-" leadership rating in the climate category from the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP). It also made Newsweek's 2026 list of "America's Greenest Companies". WD said it was named one of the "World's Most Ethical Companies" by Ethisphere for the 8th consecutive year.

Jackie Jung (정재키), WD's chief sustainability officer, said the challenge is not limited to storing more data as AI drives unprecedented growth in data volumes. "Storing and operating efficiently even at scale is key," she said. "Everything we do, including recovering rare-earth materials that could otherwise disappear, strengthening accountability and transparency across the supply chain, and operating to the highest ethical standards, demonstrates our commitment to being a trusted partner for customers, communities and the planet," she added.