Google’s greenhouse gas emissions in 2023 were 48% higher than in 2019, according to its latest environmental report. The tech giant attributes this increase to the soaring energy demands of its data centers, driven by the explosive growth of artificial intelligence (AI).
AI-powered services require significantly more computing power—and consequently, electricity—than standard online activities, prompting numerous warnings about the technology’s environmental impact. Google’s target is to achieve net zero emissions by 2030, but the company acknowledges that “as we further integrate AI into our products, reducing emissions may be challenging.”
In its 2024 Environmental Report, Google cites “increasing energy demands from the greater intensity of AI compute” as a primary factor for the rise in emissions. Data centers, which are vast collections of computer servers, are essential for AI operations and consume vast amounts of energy. A generative AI system, such as ChatGPT, might use approximately 33 times more energy than machines running task-specific software, according to a recent study.
However, Google’s report also highlights significant global disparities in the environmental impacts of its data centers. Most of the centers in Europe and the Americas obtain the majority of their energy from carbon-free sources. This contrasts with data centers in the Middle East, Asia, and Australia, which rely much less on carbon-free energy. Overall, Google claims that about two-thirds of its energy is derived from carbon-free sources.
“If you actually go into a data center, it’s really hot and really noisy,” says Tom Jackson, professor of information and knowledge management at Loughborough University. “People don’t realize everything they’re storing in the cloud is having an impact on their digital carbon footprint,” he adds. Prof. Jackson leads the Digital Decarbonisation Design Group, which aims to measure and find solutions to reduce the carbon footprint of data usage.
“Data providers must work closely with large organizations to help them move away from storing so much of their dark data,” he says. Dark data refers to data that has been collected by organizations but either used once or not at all. Despite its inactivity, storing this data on chips still consumes large amounts of energy. “On average, 65% of the data an organization stores is dark data,” notes Prof. Jackson. He commends Google’s target of reaching net zero in its data centers by 2030 but acknowledges it will be “really tough.”
The increasing energy—and water—use of AI has prompted a series of warnings, especially as the sector is expected to grow rapidly. The head of the UK’s National Grid stated in March that the combination of AI and quantum computing would lead to a six-fold surge in demand over the next 10 years.
For more details, read the full report on https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c51yvz51k2xo
