Is AI a Help or Hindrance For Companies' Net Zero Ambitions?
The rapid expansion of AI presents both challenges and opportunities for Big Tech companies pursuing net zero emissions targets.
While AI systems demand substantial energy resources, they also offer solutions for improving sustainability across industries.
Modern AI models require extensive computational power, utilising thousands of high-performance GPUs in large-scale data centres.
According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), data centres are expected to consume over 1,000TWh of electricity globally by 2026. That's a figure comparable to Japan's annual power usage.
The impact is already evident: Microsoft has seen its electricity consumption triple since 2020, leading to a 30% increase in carbon emissions.
Google's greenhouse gas emissions have increased by 48% since 2019, with their 2024 Environmental Report showing a 13% year-over-year rise, primarily due to AI and data centre growth.
Using AI to combat climate change
Despite these challenges, companies are using AI to enhance their environmental efforts.
"AI represents a huge opportunity for sustainability," says Kate Brandt, Chief Sustainability Officer at Google.
"For example, our AI-powered efficiency recommendation system for data centres led to a 40% reduction in the energy we use for cooling.
"There's a huge opportunity for us to reduce energy consumption across our own data centre fleet and also to make [the technology] more widely available [for others to use]."
Elsewhere, Amazon is showing that AI can be applied in several different ways to improve sustainability.
"Climate change is one of the world's greatest challenges," says Kara Hurst, the firm's CSO, "and at Amazon, we know we have to move fast, constantly innovate, invest and stay nimble in order to continue to become a more sustainable company.
"AI and ML can help us meet our climate goals at the speed, scale and urgency our planet requires."
- Reducing packaging use
- Identifying damaged items to prevent waste
- Monitoring produce to reduce food waste
- Reducing returns by helping customers find the perfect fit
- Measuring the carbon footprint for products
- Preventing deforestation by democratising data
- Using AWS chips to power AI more efficiently
Will AI play an important role in net zero?
Tech companies are developing specialised hardware solutions to address energy efficiency.
Amazon's AWS Inferentia and Google's Tensor Processing Units (TPUs) are designed to run AI workloads more efficiently, reducing power consumption per computation.
Meta is exploring nuclear power to support its AI infrastructure, aiming to add between 1GW and 4GW of new nuclear capacity in the US by the early 2030s. The company matches 100% of its data centre and office electricity use with renewable energy.
PwC analysis suggests that widespread adoption of AI-driven efficiency improvements could offset the increased energy demand from data centres.
AI's optimisation capabilities in power grids, demand prediction, logistics and waste reduction could potentially result in neutral or positive overall energy impact.
The technology sector's approach to managing AI's environmental impact will influence not only their own sustainability goals but also global climate change efforts. While AI presents energy challenges, it simultaneously offers tools to accelerate progress toward net zero targets.
