Microsoft released its 2021 environmental sustainability report Thursday, covering progress on climate impact, water conservation, waste reduction and ecosystem protection.
Redmond, wash – this software and cloud computing giant has a wide range of environmental protection plans, and many people focus on one number: how big is the company’s carbon footprint?
What is the answer? Bigger than they want.
After three years of slight reduction in emissions, Microsoft’s carbon dioxide emissions increased from 11.2 million metric tons in 2020 to 13.8 million metric tons last year, an increase of 21%.
Microsoft has vowed to remain transparent on climate change, and company leaders did not recognize this significant increase until the third paragraph of the report.
“2021 is a year of success and challenges,” President Brad Smith and chief environmental officer Lucas Joppa said in the report.
Although the company has reduced some emission sources, it has increased in the large-scale “scope 3” category, which covers emissions from third parties – i.e. goods and services purchased by Microsoft, energy used by Microsoft consumer products, and concrete and steel required for its construction projects.
“Our scope 3 emissions are increasing year by year, largely due to the significant expansion of global data centers and the increase in Xbox sales and usage caused by the epidemic,” Smith and Joppa said.
Microsoft has set a goal of achieving negative carbon emissions by 2030. By then, the company has committed to halving its scope 3 emissions from 2020 levels and offsetting the remaining carbon emissions. Last year, the company paid for the removal of 1.4 million tons of carbon through reforestation, carbon capture from the air and other efforts. The company plans to purchase 1.5 million tons of compensation in this fiscal year.
With the increase of emissions, the company’s profits are also increasing. Last December, Microsoft announced a profit of $18.8 billion, an increase of 21%. In their blog post on the sustainability report, Smith and Joppa said that annual business revenue increased by 20% last year.
Although the company is one of the most valuable companies in the world, with a market value of about US $2.16 trillion, its carbon footprint of 13.8 million metric tons is relatively small. In contrast, Washington state’s emissions in 2018 were 99.6 million metric tons, which is the latest available data.
Competitor Amazon also reported an increase in emissions in its 2020 report. During the epidemic, its carbon footprint increased by 19% as its sales soared. Amazon has not released 2021 data yet.
Microsoft also pointed out in the report:
Of its four-year, $1 billion climate innovation fund, $471 million is used for climate technology projects to reduce or eliminate carbon and address the challenges of water and waste. Recent investments include lanzajet, blocpower and eversource.
A $100 million grant was given to breakthrough energy catalysts, led by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, to fund the commercialization of climate technology.
Signed an agreement to purchase about 58 gigawatts of renewable energy from projects in 10 countries.
Launch Microsoft cloud for sustainability, which is a platform to help organizations manage sustainable development projects; This work is carried out in “public preview”
Increase the internal carbon emission fee, which is the fee charged by the company for its own operations to help pay for sustainability initiatives such as the purchase of cleaner aviation fuel.
Other achievements mentioned in the report include the protection of more than 17000 acres of land; Expand its artificial intelligence earth program; Invest in projects to provide clean water and make-up water; Certification of four zero waste data centers; And plans to establish more “circulation centers”, in which 90% of the electronic equipment in the data center can be reused.
Although Microsoft has always been a business leader on climate issues, it has also been criticized for providing azure cloud services to oil and gas giants such as shell and Chevron.
Smith and Joppa ended their blog with a statement about their work in the energy industry.
“While we will continue to provide business technology to anyone, we will work most closely with energy industry customers who will achieve a net zero emission target by 2050, recognizing that they will play a transformative role in meeting the world’s renewable energy needs,” they said.
Last year, shell pledged to achieve this goal. Chevron and Exxon each announced their “desire” to achieve net zero emissions – but their statistics did not include range 3 emissions.
It remains to be seen how this commitment will “work most closely” with energy companies with climate goals.