As Google has rushed to incorporate artificial intelligence into its core products — with sometimes less-than-stellar results — a problem has been brewing behind the scenes: the systems needed to power its AI tools have vastly increased the company's greenhouse gas emissions.
AI systems need lots of computers to make them work. The data centers needed to run them, essentially warehouses full of powerful computing equipment, suck up tons of energy to process data and manage the heat all of those computers produce.
The end result has been that Google's greenhouse gas emissions have soared 48% since 2019, according to the tech giant's annual environment report. Google blamed that growth mainly on "increased data center energy consumption and supply chain emissions."
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📷: Mike Kai Chen/Bloomberg/Getty Images/File
Technological innovation in sustainable construction is accelerating as global decarbonisation targets grow more urgent. The UK’s Sizewell C nuclear project has secured financial close, reinforcing the integration of low‑carbon energy infrastructure into long‑term national planning and supporting net zero whole life carbon ambitions. Nuclear power remains debated, yet its role in reducing the carbon footprint of construction highlights the importance of reliable clean energy for delivering net zero carbon buildings and low carbon design strategies.
The Environmental Services Association’s proposal to expand energy‑from‑waste plants within urban heat networks illustrates how circular economy in construction principles are advancing. Converting waste output into district heating aligns with circular construction strategies that prioritise resource efficiency in construction and end‑of‑life reuse in construction, turning linear waste streams into carbon‑neutral infrastructure.
Operational shifts such as Sunbelt Rentals’ move to all‑electric depots demonstrate how whole life carbon assessment frameworks are shaping business models. Electrifying high‑energy‑use depots reveals practical progress in reducing embodied carbon and embodied carbon in materials, marking a step toward eco‑friendly construction and broader environmental sustainability in construction. Such initiatives reflect how sustainable building design and sustainable material specification now influence every stage of the building lifecycle performance.
Capital markets are responding with unprecedented commitment to sustainable infrastructure. Global transition‑finance funds have reached $644 billion, signalling growing investor confidence in whole life carbon evaluation, lifecycle assessment, and life cycle cost analysis. Yet delivery depends on regulatory certainty that embeds low carbon building requirements and BREEAM v7 standards into planning systems.
A paradigm shift is underway where climate resilience, sustainable design, and environmental product declarations (EPDs) define the baseline for sustainable building practices. Meeting the scale of change required will rely on accelerating eco‑design for buildings, advancing low carbon construction materials, and achieving measurable carbon footprint reduction across every asset class. The sustainability of the built environment now rests on how decisively policymakers, developers, and engineers decarbonise the systems that construct it.
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