Most of the well-known largest technology companies have established ambitious clean energy goals. They are on record for achieving net-zero emissions for all their operations and supply chains in many cases by 2030. As a result, they have been investing heavily in renewable energy in various ways. Despite these lofty goals and sincere efforts, many of them are struggling to reduce emissions. The reason is simple: big data.
A good example is Google, which started investing in renewable energy in 2010 and since 2017 has been purchasing renewable energy on an annual basis to match the electricity consumption of its global operations. However, Google’s greenhouse gas emissions have increased nearly 48% since 2019. This is primarily a result of data center energy consumption.
The expanding use of artificial intelligence technology is consuming large amounts of electricity. For example, a single ChatGPT query uses nearly 10 times as much electrical energy as a traditional Google search.
Google is by no means unique in having this problem. Microsoft’s carbon emissions have risen by nearly 30% since 2020. Amazon is struggling to reach net-zero across its operations by 2040.
All of these companies are entering into large power agreements with renewable energy companies all across the country. The AI arms race for more and more computational power is driving a race to install more and more large-scale renewable energy. Power purchase agreements for solar power, wind power, and even geothermal power are becoming a major activity for most of the largest tech companies.
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Can Google gobble up enough renewables?
Photo, posted February 12, 2023, courtesy of Geoff Henson via Flickr.
Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio
