Microsoft continue to drop their carbon emissions, leading the way in their drive to have zero carbon emissions and use energy efficiently, saving what Green energy they do use.
Even more than just going carbon negative by 2030, Microsoft are also aiming to remove an amount of CO2 from the atmosphere that is equivalent to all of their historic emissions by 2050. This is great news for the environmentally friendly search engine Ecosa too!
Carbon Neutral Progress
Microsoft are really big on working with partners to help them also become carbon neutral because they can’t actually reach their target unless their suppliers also reduce their emissions. It seems to be the case that Microsoft will need to rely on buying carbon removal capacity to make up for any suppliers that can’t be net zero on their carbon emissions.
Progress seems to be going well, with the American company saying they have taken “strides forward on zero carbon energy, continued progress on carbon removal, and improved [their] methodologies and measurement of emissions data across the company.”
Reduced Carbon Tech Innovation
Not only in the background, but also in their own front-line technology, we can see Microsoft making strides. One good example is their search engine Bing, which will for sure be able to use underwater data centres to help reduce carbon emissions and energy use because they won’t require air conditioning or other infrastructure.
Bing is now using something called IndexNow to reduce the load on their data centres. It works by waiting for websites to notify Bing about new pages instead of using processing power and thus energy to be continually searching the internet to discover new information. Isn’t that just amazing? You’ll already know that using less energy will mean they’ll be able to remove their historic CO2 super quick.
Microsoft’s devices are also subject to amazing innovations that help them use less power which help drop carbon emissions for the company as a whole. You’ll probably already be aware of many environmentally friendly mobile phone innovations, and Microsoft’s devices are also becoming more and more efficient. Microsoft’s Surface Pro 8 is even more energy efficient than ever, Surface Laptop Studio has a 30% reduced carbon footprint compared with its predecessors and its gaming console the Xbox has a new super low-power standby mode that uses as little as 0.5W.
Of course, you could always just follow our first of eight tips for eco living and switch off your devices instead. You probably always do, but we all know most people who aren’t invested in the future of our planet won’t do it.
Investment in Carbon Reduction
It’s amazing to think that Microsoft also created a $1bn Climate Innovation Fund which it hopes will accelerate the global development of carbon reduction and removal technologies. When large organisations like Microsoft really get on board with stopping climate change, things will get done. There will be more jobs and even more innovation.
The Future of Emissions
What is also essential for the world is to agree on the meaning of language we use like net zero emissions and carbon neutral. If we don’t have that understanding, our progress will be limited. In fact, a lack of commonly used definitions will leave us open to greenwashing, where companies make it sound like they’re doing something great for the environment when it’s not the case.
As we move forward towards a more renewable world, the work of organisations like Microsoft will not be forgotten.
At least you can check your carbon emissions using our carbon calculator that takes into consideration your use of products from companies like Microsoft.