ABBOTT PARK, IL – Abbott, the global healthcare company, announced it will be the first FORTUNE 500 company to go “carbon neutral” with its entire U.S. fleet of company sales vehicles.

Abbott’s fleet represents close to 11 percent of the company’s total emissions. Abbott will reduce the carbon emissions from its 6,000-vehicle fleet in the United States by offering a hybrid vehicle option starting immediately. The company will then purchase carbon offsets in early 2008 to neutralize the balance of the fleet’s impact on the environment — to become ‘carbon neutral.’

Abbott’s new Global Energy Policy outlines several commitments the company is making to further improve its impact on the environment, including goals to:

• Achieve a 12 percent reduction in overall electric energy purchased by 2011.
  

• Achieve a 30 percent reduction in overall CO2 emissions by 2011.
  

• Invest in renewable energy capital projects, or energy sourcing, that produce no CO2 emissions at major manufacturing locations by 2011.
  

• Eliminate 12 percent of combined fuel oil/coal consumption by switching to cleaner fuels by 2011.