Big Tech Carbon Credit Purchases Surge 800x Since 2022
Get the Energy newsletter
Daily energy & climate — solar, EVs, oil, the policy fights and tech bets shaping the transition. Free.
- Amazon, Google, Meta, and Microsoft are expected to invest nearly $700 billion in AI in 2026, with the four firms together purchasing 11.92 million permanent carbon removal credits in 2023 — up from just 14,200 in 2022, tied to widespread AI rollout since that year.
- Microsoft reported a 337% rise in credit purchases between 2023 and 2024, reaching 21.9 million credits, and is targeting carbon-negative operations by 2030, according to chief sustainability officer Melanie Nakagawa.
- Data centres currently account for at least 0.5% of global GHG emissions — a share the IEA expects to nearly triple to 1.4% within five years, equivalent to Japan's total annual emissions.
- Global data centre electricity consumption has risen roughly 12% annually since 2017, with power demand growing four times faster than all other sectors combined, per the IEA.
- A 2025 review paper analysing 25 years of carbon offset evidence found failures are "not a few bad apples" but systemic, and that 2024 UN climate summit rules "did not substantially address the quality problem," according to co-author Stephen Lezak.
- Carbon credit purchases are not currently subject to mandatory reporting requirements, meaning even the 11.9 million credit figure is self-reported by the companies.
- Carbon Business Council's Ben Rubin called the 2023 demand surge "the beginning of a structural shift," with buyers seeking "to secure future supply, send demand signals to the market, and address residual emissions."
Why it matters: The four biggest AI investors multiplied carbon credit purchases roughly 840-fold in a single year while data centre emissions are projected to nearly triple by 2030. A 25-year peer-reviewed review concludes the credits themselves don't work, and there is no mandatory reporting requirement to verify the offset claims underpinning these companies' net-zero pledges.
