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In September 2020, Google CEO Sundar Pichai heralded a new era of climate action for the tech giant, vowing to make Google “the first major company to operate carbon free — 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.” Five years later, the path to a carbon-free future has proven more complex, with Google making significant changes to its public sustainability commitments.
An investigation by Canada’s National Observer reveals that Google has quietly demoted its prominent net-zero emissions pledge, originally set for 2030, from a dedicated section on its Sustainability website to an entry within the appendices of its latest sustainability report.
The Evolution of Google’s Climate Goals
Google’s Sustainability website, which proudly displayed its 2030 net-zero ambition as recently as June, underwent a significant revision in late June and July. Most direct mentions of its lauded net-zero goals were removed, according to historical tracing of the site.
While an external spokesperson, Genna Schnurbach, stated, “As you can see from the document, Google is still committed to their ambition of net zero by 2030,” the public-facing presentation of this commitment has undeniably shifted. A separate website dedicated to data centers, however, still retains its original language regarding net-zero pledges.
AI’s Impact on Energy Consumption
The primary driver behind this recalibration appears to be the burgeoning demand for energy from artificial intelligence (AI) data centers. Google’s “Environment 2025” report acknowledges, “Running the global infrastructure behind our products and services, including AI, takes considerable energy.” The report indicates that meeting its previous net-zero targets has become increasingly challenging, partly due to AI expansion.
The “Operating Sustainably” page has been rebranded simply to “Operations,” with the section on net-zero carbon deleted. In its place, a new priority area, “Energy,” now features prominently. This shift comes as Big Tech companies race to build power-intensive hyperscale data centers to capitalize on the global AI boom.
Big Tech’s Shifting Sands of Sustainability
Once a “gold standard” for climate action among tech giants, Google’s move contrasts with peers like Microsoft and Amazon, whose latest sustainability reports continue to highlight net-zero emissions as a central priority. The online tool Wayback Archive was instrumental in uncovering these changes to Google’s operating sustainability page.
The numbers underscore the challenge: Google’s annual electricity consumption surged by 26 percent in 2024, reaching 32.2 terawatt-hours—nearly equivalent to Ireland’s national consumption. A single chat message on Google’s Gemini AI model, for instance, consumes 0.24 watt-hours, comparable to running a small LED bulb for 2.4 minutes.
A McKinsey & Co report estimates that by 2030, $6.7 trillion in new global investment will be needed to keep pace with computing power demand. Data centers for AI processing alone could require $5.2 trillion. The consultancy predicts that AI workloads could drive approximately 70 percent of new electricity demand, with global data center capacity expected to rise 3.5-fold to nearly 250 gigawatts by 2030. In the U.S., this could see the sector account for almost 12 percent of total national energy demand, up from just over five percent today.
Clean energy analyst Michael Barnard notes that “the pressure to get any possible source of electricity is rather overwhelming right now.” This sentiment is echoed by a New Climate Institute report, which warns of a “climate strategy crisis” in the tech sector, where emissions targets “lost their meaning amid soaring energy demand.”
Political Climate and Corporate Responses
The increased energy demand from AI growth coincides with a political landscape where climate policies face potential rollbacks and corporate sustainability efforts are sometimes disparaged. Barnard points to a “tightrope” walk for Google, observing both its chief investment officer advocating for “incredibly clean” coal plants and the company’s continued investment in renewable energy sources like hydropower, offshore wind, and advanced geothermal.
John Lang, co-founder of Net Zero Tracker, suggests the world is in a “net-zero recession,” largely concentrated in finance and fossil fuel sectors. He argues that in other sectors, companies are recalibrating early sustainability goals to be more realistic and reduce reliance on carbon credits, which he views as a positive development.
Google, whose parent company Alphabet boasts a market cap of US$2.79 trillion, adopts a somewhat ambiguous stance. Despite removing the headline net-zero pledge, the company maintains its commitment to the 2030 goal, which heavily relies on carbon offsetting. This reliance raises questions, as the UN’s High-Level Expert Group on Net Zero Emissions Commitments has previously warned that unrealistic pledges can “erode confidence” in overall net-zero efforts.
Lang, however, expresses sympathy for “stretch goals” like Google’s initial climate moonshots, provided deadlines are set to motivate urgency and are ultimately achievable. He commends Google’s $200 million investment in durable carbon removals as a positive precedent.
It remains to be seen whether Google’s decision to adjust its net-zero visibility sets a concerning trend for corporate climate action or represents a necessary recalibration in the face of unprecedented technological growth. Lang remains optimistic, asserting that rapid emissions reductions are “our one and only solution to climate change. It’s as simple as that. There’s no other option.”