Microsoft in new Scope 3 bid as AI emissions soar
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As Canadian wildfire smoke starts to pour into the northern U.S. for a second summer, it should become clear to investors that grand government programs and international cooperation cannot move fast enough to hold global warming at bay.
Against that backdrop, more companies — particularly large tech players in AI — are stepping up to make sure they can lower their carbon footprints even as they seek ever more energy from our aging electric grids to develop AI products.
Microsoft MSFT 0.00%↑ is quickly becoming the leader in this field. Just a few weeks after announcing the largest purchase of new clean energy to date, the tech giant said this week it would clean up its vast supply chain of harmful emissions by the end of the decade.
The company, with more than 90% of its (growing) carbon footprint coming from its chain of thousands of suppliers according to the Wall Street Journal, joins Amazon AMZN 0.00%↑ , Google GOOGL 0.00%↑ , Facebook META 0.00%↑ , and even Wal-Mart WMT 0.00%↑ in moving to clean up its supply chains. This comes even after political squabbling and lawsuits have prevented U.S. securities regulators from passing emission disclosure laws that allow investors to track such progress in supply chains.
For the tech companies, it’s about more than just the climate future, too. The power demands from their AI work are forecast to more than triple in coming years and they need clean energy to be able to drive them while also cutting their emissions. Microsoft’s own emissions are up 30% since 2020 because of AI — almost all Scope 3, or supply chain related.
It’s not yet every man or woman for themselves against global warming, but at a time when U.S. regulators are so hell bent on bringing the tech giants to their knees, it’s interesting to see that these giants are really the only ones trying to make a difference on emissions as global warming bears down on us.
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Renewables are meeting 95% of Portugal’s electricity needs
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Latest findings: New research, studies and projects
Shipping’s fair share
In July 2023, the International Maritime Organization resolved to reduce international shipping’s greenhouse gas emissions to net zero “by or around, i.e., close to” 2050. There is a long-running debate about whether the sector should decarbonize and how it could do so in a way that is equitable for states and the shipping industry. This article, titled Shipping’s Fair Share is the first to normatively define shipping’s fair share of the overall climate mitigation burden using principles of international environmental law. It refers to the IMO’s institutional rules and practice to identify relevant principles, evaluates emission reduction pathways based on the sector’s technological potential, and determines that its fair share would be its highest possible ambition in light of its unique capacity to mitigate. The article ties shipping’s climate goals to a framework of international environmental law, and offers a structure to assess its ambition going forward. Authors: Baine P. Kerr, Utrecht University
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Words to live by . . . .
“When we contemplate the whole globe as one great dewdrop, striped and dotted with continents and islands, flying through space with other stars all singing and shining together as one, the whole universe appears as an infinite storm of beauty.” — John Muir.