Tech Giants' Indirect Emissions Rose 150% In Three Years (reuters.com)
- Reference: 0178001355
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/06/10/2154202/tech-giants-indirect-emissions-rose-150-in-three-years
- Source link: https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/climate-energy/tech-giants-indirect-emissions-rose-150-three-years-ai-expands-un-agency-says-2025-06-05/
> Indirect carbon emissions from the operations of four of the leading AI-focused tech companies [1]rose on average by 150% from 2020-2023 , due to the demands of power-hungry data centers, a [2]United Nations report (PDF) said on Thursday. The use of artificial intelligence by Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet and Meta drove up their global indirect emissions because of the vast amounts of energy required to power data centers, the report by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the U.N. agency for digital technologies, said.
>
> Indirect emissions include those generated by purchased electricity, steam, heating and cooling consumed by a company. Amazon's operational carbon emissions grew the most at 182% in 2023 compared to three years before, followed by Microsoft at 155%, Meta at 145% and Alphabet at 138%, according to the report. The ITU tracked the greenhouse gas emissions of 200 leading digital companies between 2020 and 2023. [...] As investment in AI increases, carbon emissions from the top-emitting AI systems are predicted to reach up to 102.6 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent per year, the report stated.
>
> The data centres that are needed for AI development could also put pressure on existing energy infrastructure. "The rapid growth of artificial intelligence is driving a sharp rise in global electricity demand, with electricity use by data centers increasing four times faster than the overall rise in electricity consumption," the report found. It also highlighted that although a growing number of digital companies had set emissions targets, those ambitions had not yet fully translated into actual reductions of emissions.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/climate-energy/tech-giants-indirect-emissions-rose-150-three-years-ai-expands-un-agency-says-2025-06-05/
[2] https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Environment/Documents/Publications/2025/Greening%20Digital%20Companies%202025%20Final.pdf
But "nobody wants nukes", right? (Score:1)
Nuclear power was mentioned as a means to produce low CO2 emitting energy to power data centers in the future. This will undoubtedly bring out the commenters on how nuclear power costs too much, therefore "nobody wants nukes". Here's one answer to that: [1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
A summary of the video could be that as good as renewable energy may be in lowering CO2 emissions they cannot provide the required base load power for a stable electrical grid, for that we need nuclear power as part of the
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPjBj1TEmRQ
Re: (Score:1)
POTUS is not interested in nuclear power? How did you find that link on coal from the White House without seeing these:
[1]https://www.whitehouse.gov/pre... [whitehouse.gov]
[2]https://www.whitehouse.gov/pre... [whitehouse.gov]
[3]https://www.whitehouse.gov/pre... [whitehouse.gov]
President Carter effectively killed the nuclear power industry in 1980/1981 with his reaction to the meltdown at Three Mile Island. I've seen claims that Carter knew the meltdown was a relative non-event but he didn't want to go against the anti-nuclear people in the Democrat party. Reagan
[1] https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/05/deploying-advanced-nuclear-reactor-technologies-for-national-security/
[2] https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/05/ordering-the-reform-of-the-nuclear-regulatory-commission/
[3] https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/05/reforming-nuclear-reactor-testing-at-the-department-of-energy/
Indirect is unfair (Score:2)
If you measure indirect emissions, you blame energy users for the choices of electricity companies. When they add more fossile energy to the mix they are not asking their customers before, but increase the indirect emissions for them.
Why? (Score:3)
Why does it seem like big tech is always doing more harm than good? The promise back in the 80s and 90s was that it was going to make the world a better place. So far it's done far more harm than good in my opinion.
Re: Why? (Score:2)
Because the vested parties are trying to fuck up the world.
And no, I don't mean big tech.
Re: Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Because greed.
Re: (Score:3)
There were never promises made that the big companies were going to make the world a better place.
The most ambitious promise from google of old was to try not to make it a worse place, but that was rescinded early on.
And nothing was delivered while it was allegedly in use.
Re: (Score:1)
> Why does it seem like big tech is always doing more harm than good?
Because twisting the facts to fit that narrative generates clicks.
> So far it's done far more harm than good in my opinion.
Yet, here you are, posting on the Internet using technology created by Big Tech.
Re: (Score:3)
> Yet, here you are, posting on the Internet using technology created by Big Tech.
Slashdot does pretty well at avoiding what one would normally label "Big Tech" in its implementation.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Slashdot is built on something like the following hierarchy:
- HTML / CSS / JavaScript (Front end)
- Perl (Back end)
- MySQL (DB)
- Apache / mod_perl (Web server)
- Linux (OS)
- TCP/IP, HTTP
Re: (Score:2)
When they discovered that electricity can make line go up, all their climate promises meant exactly jack and shit.
Don't Be Evil (unless it is profitable).
Re: (Score:2)
Well, the energy mix is the responsibility of the government...