Google says its recently published 2024 environmental report showcases its efforts into harnessing technology, particularly AI, to ‘drive positive environmental change and operate [its] business sustainably.’ Yet the company’s total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have risen by 13% year on year, marking an overall increase for every year since 2020.
The uptick to 14.3 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2e), a 48% increase compared to Google’s 2019 target base year, was ‘primarily’ down to increases in data centre energy consumption and supply chain emissions, the company said.
What is causing this greater consumption? “As we further integrate AI into our products, reducing emissions may be challenging due to increasing energy demands from the greater intensity of AI compute, and the emissions associated with the expected increases in our technical infrastructure investment,” Google noted in the report.
The detrimental energy impact of AI right now is being cited as something of a necessary evil. Google notes its ‘bold and responsible’ approach, arguing that scaling up AI applications and finding new use cases is ‘crucial’ to accelerating climate action. The company cited a 2021 statistic from Boston Consulting Group which found AI has the potential to help mitigate up to 10% of GHG emissions by 2030.
Nicholas Stern, chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at LSE (London School of Economics), advocated for this in a guest post on the Google Sustainability blog. “Together, [AI and machine learning] can unlock new growth that is sustainable, resilient, and equitable – whilst managing the immense and urgent risks of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution,” wrote Stern.
Google added that cloud and hyperscale data centres collectively represent an estimated 0.1%-0.2% of global GHG emissions. The company cited figures from the IEA (International Energy Agency) which argue estimated global data centre electricity consumption represent just over 1% of global electricity demand.
The other side of this equation is with regard to greater infrastructure efficiency, among other technologies. Google cited Trillium, its latest TPU (Tensor Processing Unit), which is more than 67% more efficient than the previous generation, as an example.
Responsible water use practices help in this regard as well; the company says a Google-owned and -operated data centre is, on average, approximately 1.8 times as energy efficient as a typical enterprise data centre. Google noted that in 2023 its water stewardship project replenished an estimated 1 billion gallons of water, at 18% of its overall freshwater consumption.
Other milestones in 2023 included 10 of Google’s grid regions achieving at least 90% carbon free energy (CFE), and a global average of 64% CFE in spite of total electricity load increasing across its data centres. The company also signed contracts to purchase approximately 4 gigawatts of clean energy generation capacity, as well as ensured packaging for new Google products launched and manufactured in 2023 was at least 99% plastic-free.
For partners, Google introduced a Renewable Energy Addendum which asks its largest hardware manufacturing suppliers to commit to a 100% renewable energy match by 2029.
“A sustainable future requires systems-level change, strong government policies and new technologies,” wrote Kate Brandt, Google chief sustainability officer, and Ben Gomes, SVP learning and sustainability. “We’re committed to collaboration and playing our part, every step of the way.”
You can read the full Google Environmental Report 2024 here.
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