Microsoft May Abandon its Clean Energy Powered Data Centre Targets

The hyperscaler has been adding a gigawatt of data centre capacity, enough to power 750,000 homes, every three months

By Alastair Marsh and Brody Ford

Microsoft Corp. may shelve one of the industry’s most ambitious clean-energy targets as it tries to remove hurdles that could hold it back in the race to power data centres, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

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The company is weighing whether to delay — or even abandon altogether — its 2030 target of matching 100 per cent of its hourly electricity use with renewable energy purchases, according to the people, who requested anonymity to discuss a private matter.

The costly and energy-intensive build-out of data centres is affecting views on the feasibility of climate commitments made before the AI era, the people said. Talks inside Microsoft are ongoing and no final decision has been made, they also said.

A spokesperson for Microsoft said the company continues to look for opportunities to maintain an annual matching goal, without commenting on the much tougher hourly commitment.

Such a retreat would mark a significant shift. Big Tech has long stood out for its public embrace of some unusually ambitious emissions-cutting goals, with Microsoft even pledging to remove more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than it emits. But as companies including Amazon.com Inc. and Meta Platforms Inc. try to secure enough energy to meet the demands of artificial intelligence, the appeal of natural gas has been growing.

“In the race to get data centres up and running as soon as possible, clean energy targets are out of the window,” said Alexia Kelly, the former director of net zero and nature at Netflix Inc., who is now the managing director of the carbon policy and markets initiative at High Tide Foundation. Instead, “gas seems to be the fuel of choice.”