Climate alarmists were already steamed at Microsoft for ceasing single-handedly to prop up the illusory carbon storage market. And it just got worse. A lot worse. Bloomberg Green reports that “Microsoft is reconsidering its ambitious plan to match the power consumption of its data centers with 100% clean energy produced at the same time, on the same grid.” The problem being, of course, that (all together now) alternative energy just can’t do the job. Microsoft is deflecting blame to AI, or possibly just noticing that its own prosperity is threatened instead merely of that of its customers. But it is noteworthy that until very recently firms felt, or at least felt they had to pretend that they were like totally into Net Zero and would get there and we’d all be richer. Seems them days is gone.
The BG story cites “people with knowledge of the matter”. Which we like even less than “experts say”. But it is credible that someone on the inside, either right inside Microsoft or inside one of its prospective suppliers of unicorn power, has blabbed, perhaps in protest:
“The costly and energy-intensive build-out of data centers is affecting views on the feasibility of climate commitments made before the AI era, the people said. Talks inside Microsoft are ongoing and no final decision has been made, they also said.”
It’s the revenge of economics, which deals in real-world tradeoffs so it’s also the revenge of physics:
“Big Tech has long stood out for its public embrace of some unusually ambitious emissions-cutting goals, with Microsoft even pledging to remove more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than it emits. But as companies including Amazon.com Inc. and Meta Platforms Inc. try to secure enough energy to meet the demands of artificial intelligence, the appeal of natural gas has been growing.”
Strange. Just like trying to secure enough energy to heat your home, cook your food, get to work and that kind of prosaic stuff. Mind you Bloomberg Green isn’t giving up entirely:
“Announced in 2021, Microsoft’s flagship clean-power goal – dubbed 100/100/0 – was meant to match 100% of its electricity consumption, 100% of the time, with zero-carbon energy purchases (all from the same power grids from which it was drawing the energy). The hour-by-hour matching commitment was considerably more ambitious than Microsoft’s previous target, which it has already met, of buying enough renewable energy to match its annual electricity consumption.”
We’d like to see the receipts on the last one. Especially as if it’s covering its annual consumption with its annual purchases, what’s the problem? And the answer is:
“In their latest sustainability reports, Meta, Alphabet Inc.’s Google, Amazon and Microsoft said their carbon emissions went up 64%, 51%, 33% and 23%, respectively, compared with benchmarks predating the first release of ChatGPT in late 2022. Microsoft singled out ‘growth-related factors such as AI and cloud expansion’ as reasons behind the surge in emissions.”
So how’s it got surging emissions and all renewable energy all year long? Someone’s not doing the math. Which is, admittedly, a persistent problem in this area.
It’s happening at a time when, Robert Bryce notes, data centres are already attracting massive public ire. So if Microsoft thinks it’s a good time to admit the jig is up on this particular piece of PR, they presumably also figure it wasn’t something real people actually cared much about anyway.
