Counting carbon - part 1

Google today (in the UK) has blacked its screen…. 

 

The company explains, “We’ve turned the lights out. Now it’s your turn - Earth Hour“. Google explains this is an awareness raising gesture not in itself an effort to save energy (black screens use the same power as white ones). 

What of Google’s efforts to take ownership of its own carbon footprint? The black screen carries a link to an explanatory page detailing research and investment into renewable energy sources. Fair enough. 

But how big is Google’s carbon footprint? The company won’t say, claiming it is commercially sensitive. The data they provide to the Carbon Disclosure Project is not - err disclosed. At the same time Google claims to be carbon neutral, having purchased offsets to balance their (unknown) footprint. 

A scan down the ICT sector data in CDC raises more questions than it answers: 

Dell – 0.38 million tonnes CO2Google – not disclosed but ‘carbon neutral’
HP – 1.6 million tonnes CO2
Intel – 3.9 million tonnes CO2
Microsoft – 0.42 million tonnes CO2
Yahoo – not disclosed but ‘carbon neutral’ 

Should we trust the carbon neutral claims? Both companies say their data is independently audited. Is this enough?

I think not. Even if the data has been properly collected and the offsets rigorously arranged (two huge assumptions) we want to know the size of the problem. The Stern Report estimated that the internet is responsible for approximately the same amount of greenhouse gas emissions as global aviation. This was a revelation to many, who had seen the ‘virtual’ sector as almost impact free.  

So how good an argument is commercial sensitivity? I imagine it would be simple to estimate the number of servers (or total storage) Google and yahoo have from their carbon footprints and that’s why they are so shy about carbon. Googling the question reveals a lot of speculation in geek circles, with estimates between 100,000 and 500,000 servers for Google.

Another tack would be to look at their energy bill which might be assumed to be material to their annual accounts. I haven’t checked – but let me know if it’s there. 

If we accept that there are certain sectors where carbon footprints cannot be disclosed to the public, we need to be thinking about a trusted authority to verify claims. Not individual hired auditors and definitely not carbon offset arrangers. Something analogous to the supervision of disarmament in Northern Ireland where the militarised factions would not reveal their armouries to one another. 

On the whole though, openness should be the rule. Openness would mean we could have more confidence in the data, we could understand the consequences of our own IT use and we could trust the likes of Google and yahoo better. Notice anything strange about the other ICT companies in the list above? How can Microsoft and Dell be under half a million tonnes CO2? That will be the subject of my next blog – but at least their willingness to be open with their data allows us to discuss it. 

CR Sage.