big number
300 million metric tons. That’s the amount of global carbon dioxide emissions from data center electricity use the International Energy Agency expects by 2035, nearly doubling from 180 million tons today.
tangent
Officials in Cheyenne, Wyoming, have reportedly traced the construction of a Wyoming-based data center for Meta to a rare bacterium found in the city’s wastewater treatment center. The bacterium did not enter the city’s drinking supply, and the Cheyenne Board of Public Utilities said it would pause accepting industrial water discharge from any data center.
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key background
Microsoft pledged in 2020 to pull more carbon from the atmosphere than it emits by 2030, but its goal has seemingly hit a roadblock in recent years as companies sparked a frenzy building AI infrastructure. Microsoft has announced several data center projects over the last year, including a $3 billion site in Wisconsin the company claims will be the most advanced AI data center in the world, the Wall Street Journal reported. Other tech giants have pointed to surging AI demand as driving an increase in carbon emissions: Alphabet reported a 48% increase in emissions from 2019 to 2024, citing an uptick in data center operations and growing demand for AI products. The Google parent acquired the clean energy startup Intersect Power in December as it planned to rely on renewable energy for data center projects.
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further reading
ForbesAlphabet Buys Clean Energy Startup For AI Data Centers In $4.75 Billion DealBy Ty Roush