Lockheed Martin, RTX, Northrop Grumman, General Dynamics and Boeing cited climate-related risks that could negatively impact their ability to maintain plant operations and supply chains, impacting defense readiness, according to the filings.
Lockheed Martin, the largest U.S. defense contractor, is best known for producing the F-35 fighter jet and the C-130 transport plane. In Lockheed Martin's most recent 10-Q filing, the company noted $669 million in environmental liabilities.
The firm's quarterly report for the period ended June 25 noted that "We are involved in proceedings and potential proceedings relating to soil, sediment, surface water and groundwater contamination, disposal of hazardous substances, and other environmental matters at several of our current or former facilities, other facilities for which we may have contractual responsibility."
The other four firms cited climate related risks in forward-looking statements. For example, RTX said "Regulations on greenhouse gas emissions, carbon pricing and energy taxes could lead to new or additional investment in product designs and facility upgrades and could increase our operational and environmental compliance expenditures."
RTX manufactures the Patriot missile system and Tomahawk cruise missile.
Recurring vulnerabilities
With more than $771 billion in Pentagon contracts combined, the defense giants cite three recurring vulnerabilities: damage to plants and bases from extreme weather events, increased costs of fuel and energy supply, and exposure to regulatory risks with demand for emissions reporting.
The risks they cite align with the 2024 Department of Defense Climate Adaptation Plan, which warned that climate change poses an immediate strain on U.S. military readiness. The DOD cited billions of dollars in recovery costs from extreme weather, including $3.7 billion to rebuild Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida after Hurricane Michael in 2018 and $3.5 billion in Guam after Typhoon Mawar in 2023.
According to the document, former Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III said, "This plan further underscores our commitment to ensure that DOD can operate under changing climate conditions, preserving operational capability and enhancing the natural and man-made systems essential to the Department's success."
The Pentagon's focus on maintaining operational capability reflects lessons learned from past events, such as a decade-old heatwave that nearly shut down central Texas missile plants. Power turbines lacked sufficient cooling water, highlighting the vulnerabilities of energy-intensive facilities and threatening production schedules. This is one example that caused the DOD to take into account climate related risks.
Former President Joe Biden released the Climate Adaptation Plan in 2024, which provided a roadmap through 2027. It is unclear whether the plan will run through 2027 or is still being implemented because the DOD did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
"The Department of Defense was one of the first federal agencies to pay attention to the potential adverse effects of climate change ... That long track record has been disrupted by this administration," Richard Kidd, former deputy assistant secretary of defense for environment and energy resilience, told UPI.
Changes in readiness
Even without clear direction from the Pentagon, former military officials say the effects of climate change already visible on the ground are forcing shifts in how readiness is managed.
"The secretary may have said early on we're not going to do 'climate change crap,' but the tone will shift when it becomes clear that extreme weather is already degrading readiness," said Will Rogers, former senior climate adviser to the secretary of the Army. Rogers served during the Biden Administration from January 2022 to 2025.
While the Trump administration has downplayed climate, the Biden administration embedded adaptation into mission readiness, steering contracts toward resilient infrastructure and low-emission technologies.
"Smart companies are preparing for a world where climate is both the context for their operations and a constraint on their license to operate," Kidd said.
Lockheed Martin, for example, has sought to align with that approach. According to its 2024 sustainability report, the contractor has cut emissions by 34% since 2015, with 65% of electricity now renewable. And it has pledged net-zero operations by 2050.
Similarly, in its sustainability report, Northrop Grumman, best known for the B-2 Spirit bomber and Global Hawk drone, called extreme weather a material risk to logistics and supply chains.
The company reported a 37% emissions reduction since 2017, and it requires suppliers to disclose climate risks.
"A clean supply chain is often a secure supply chain. If a company can do greenhouse gas accounting for its suppliers, it also knows where they are and what vulnerabilities exist," Kidd said.
Congress' role
Congress has played a steadying role through bipartisan provisions in National Defense Authorization acts that direct funding toward resilience measures, according to Erin Sikorsky, director of the Center for Climate and Security, adding that Congress has played a critical role in holding defense contractors accountable for maintaining resilient operations and follow environmental and safety standards.
Even with major political changes at the White House, military and congressional attention to climate risks has proven more durable, according to Sikorsky.
She said military leaders are "fundamentally pragmatic" and cannot ignore drought fueling instability in regions of national security interests, typhoons damaging Indo-Pacific bases or domestic wildfires.
General Dynamics, which builds the Virginia-class submarine and M1 Abrams tank, reported building an enterprise risk management framework that tracks tidal flooding at its shipyards and energy disruptions at manufacturing plants.
Climate adviser Rogers pointed to lessons from recent wars.
For example, he said, "From Iraq and Afghanistan, access to fuel was a huge liability on the battlefield. If you're consuming less fuel, that means fewer convoys on the road and people put at risk. That efficiency has climate benefits."
Building on that focus on efficiency, historically, defense officials have positioned the department as an early adopter of technologies that can spill over into other sectors.
"That, historically, has been a big role, not just in the climate area, but across a lot of different technology areas," said David Hart, climate and energy senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Boeing, which produces the AH-64 Apache helicopter and the KC-46 Pegasus tanker, has cut less than 1% of its direct greenhouse gas emissions since 2023, according to its 2025 sustainability report. The company said it prioritized direct emissions cuts before turning to carbon removal.
Strengthening resilience
This approach, though, echoed the Pentagon's 2024 Climate Adaptation Plan on reducing energy demand to strengthen mission resilience.
"I hope that contractors are continuing to press the technological edge and then offer up what they're learning to the Defense Department so that it can be taken further," Hart said.
For example, according to Lockheed Martin's website, a production line initiative for its F-35 recycles cleaning agents. And this year, Lockheed Martin's Norwegian F-35s have successfully flown using synthetic fuels derived from renewable and non-renewable sources.
"When President Biden said that all federal agencies and defense companies need to consider the impact of climate on their activities ... some of these entities started to think about their considerations with respect to climate," Rogers said.
William Greenwalt, a senior defense fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, said the difference in approach is largely structural. Public companies, such as major defense contractors, are trained to comply with government regulations, while private startups are incentivized to pursue both defense and commercial opportunities, taking on greater risk.
Startups like defense technology company Anduril Industries are positioning solar-enabled systems at the forefront, focused on providing capability.
"Energy efficiency and solar power [technologies] are adopted by the military when they offer an advantage on the battlefield," Kidd said. But Anduril's reliance on artificial intelligence-driven data centers raises new carbon challenges.
That divergence in strategy highlights a broader reality, according to Hart.
"Climate is going to keep changing [regardless of] whatever, whatever the administration chooses to pronounce," Hart said. "That's why I think it's important for the Defense Department, especially, to continue to adjust to the changing facts on the ground."
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