Google’s 2024 Environmental Report

Since our earliest days, we’ve been on an formidable journey to assist construct a extra sustainable future. An essential a part of that’s sharing what we’ve discovered alongside the best way and being clear about our progress and our challenges. That is very true given the urgency of the second — a time when technological development is converging with the necessity for vitality transition.

Our annual Environmental Report presents a deep dive into our efforts to harness expertise — notably AI — to drive optimistic environmental change and function our enterprise sustainably.

Our strategy to enabling AI for sustainability

We all know that scaling AI and utilizing it to speed up local weather motion is simply as essential as addressing the environmental affect related to it.

To assist reduce our environmental footprint, we’ve constructed world-leading environment friendly infrastructure for the AI period, together with Trillium, our sixth-generation Tensor Processing Unit (TPU), which is over 67% extra energy-efficient than TPU v5e. We’ve additionally recognized tested practices that our analysis exhibits can, when used collectively, scale back the vitality required to coach an AI mannequin by as much as 100 occasions and scale back related emissions by as much as 1,000 occasions. All these practices are used at Google right now.

We try to construct the world’s most energy-efficient computing infrastructure, supported by accountable water use practices and a dedication to minimizing waste. A Google-owned and -operated information heart is, on common, roughly 1.8 occasions as vitality environment friendly as a typical enterprise information heart. In 2023, the typical annual energy utilization effectiveness for our information facilities was 1.10 in contrast with the business common of 1.58, that means that our information facilities used about 5.8 occasions much less overhead vitality for each unit of IT tools vitality.

Final 12 months we launched a water risk framework to additional determine climate-conscious cooling options that contemplate carbon-free vitality (CFE) availability, watershed well being and future water wants. We see our rising infrastructure as a chance to drive the improvements and investments wanted to energy a low-carbon financial system.

AI holds immense promise to drive local weather motion. Actually, AI has the potential to help mitigate 5–10% of world greenhouse gasoline (GHG) emissions by 2030. We’re advancing local weather motion by way of AI in three key areas:

• Organizing info: Fuel-efficient routing makes use of AI to investigate site visitors, terrain and a automobile’s engine to recommend essentially the most environment friendly route. It’s estimated to have helped allow greater than 2.9 million metric tons of GHG emissions reductions because the characteristic launched in late 2021 to the top of 2023 — that’s equal to taking roughly 650,000 fuel-based automobiles off the street for a 12 months.
• Bettering prediction: We constructed a breakthrough world hydrological AI mannequin and mixed it with publicly accessible information sources to predict floods up to seven days in advance in over 80 nations. This covers territories the place greater than 460 million folks reside, serving to these communities put together for and reply to riverine floods.
• Higher optimization: Inexperienced Mild is an AI-based device that helps metropolis site visitors engineers optimize the timing of site visitors lights to cut back stop-and-go site visitors and gasoline consumption. This technology has the potential for as much as 30% discount in stops and as much as 10% discount in emissions at intersections.

Via our merchandise, we intention to assist people, cities and different companions collectively scale back 1 gigaton of carbon equal emissions yearly by 2030, and we’ll proceed to develop applied sciences that assist communities adapt to the consequences of local weather change.

How we’re driving sustainability throughout our operations

In 2017, Google grew to become the primary main firm to match 100% of our annual electrical energy consumption on a world foundation with renewable vitality, which we’ve achieved yearly since. Constructing on our first two decades of progress, in 2020 we launched our third decade of local weather motion — our most formidable but.

We’ve a daring aim to succeed in net-zero emissions throughout all of our operations and worth chain by 2030, supported by a aim to run on 24/7 CFE on each grid the place we function. As well as, we’re working to advance water stewardship, construct a round financial system, and restore and improve nature and biodiversity. This 12 months’s report exhibits how we proceed to make progress throughout all of those areas:

• 10 of our grid areas achieved not less than 90% CFE, and even with our whole electrical energy load growing throughout our information facilities, we maintained a world common of 64% CFE. We additionally celebrated a first-of-a-kind enhanced geothermal venture now delivering CFE to the grid.
• We signed contracts to buy roughly 4 gigawatts of fresh vitality era capability in places comparable to Texas, Belgium and Australia — greater than in any prior 12 months.
• We carried out a Google Renewable Vitality Addendum that asks our largest {hardware} manufacturing suppliers, primarily based on spend, to decide to reaching a 100% renewable vitality match by 2029.
• Our water stewardship tasks replenished an estimated 1 billion gallons of water, which represents 18% of our 2023 freshwater consumption and tripled our replenishment progress of 6% in 2022.
• For brand spanking new Google merchandise launched and manufactured in 2023, our packaging was not less than 99% plastic-free. Plus, packaging for our Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Professional makes use of 100% plastic-free supplies.

Our ongoing work to construct a sustainable future

Regardless of the progress we’re making, we face vital challenges that we’re actively working by way of. In 2023, our whole GHG emissions elevated 13% year-over-year, primarily pushed by elevated information heart vitality consumption and provide chain emissions.

Whereas we superior clear vitality on lots of the grids the place we function, there are nonetheless some hard-to-decarbonize areas like Asia-Pacific the place CFE is not available. As well as, we regularly see longer lead occasions between preliminary investments and building of fresh vitality tasks and the ensuing GHG reductions from them. To proceed to drive progress towards a low-carbon financial system, we most just lately introduced a clear transition charge that brings prospects and utilities collectively to drive new clear vitality tasks within the U.S., and we unveiled an funding to allow 1 gigawatt of latest photo voltaic capability in Taiwan.

A sustainable future requires systems-level change, sturdy authorities policies and new technologies. We’re dedicated to collaboration and taking part in our half, each step of the best way.