“What many don’t realize is that the green agenda was never about saving the planet, it was about making money and reducing competition by increasing barriers for other companies to try to compete with them in the first place.” (Thomas Marihart, below)
“Another climate commitment quietly bites the dust,” complained Ben Hardman on social media. He continued:
Remember when Google was one of the good guys? Yeah, me too. Shame it can’t be said anymore. Google has stealthily deleted their 2030 net zero pledge from their website. Gone. See ya later.
This is the same company that once proudly displayed “carbon neutral since 2007” on their homepage (ok, all done through buying carbon offsets, but we’ll park that for now). Now their footer spot has been replaced with “Applying AI towards science and the environment.” Great 🙄
Google wasn’t always like this. “Don’t be evil” wasn’t just a slogan – it was in their corporate code of conduct. They promised shareholders they’d “do good things for the world even if we forgo some short-term gains”
So what happened?
1️⃣ Start with “Don’t be evil” as your motto
2️⃣ Go public and promise to do good even when it costs you
3️⃣ Reorganise under Alphabet and change motto to “Do the right thing”
4️⃣ Commit to running on carbon-free energy 24/7 by 2030
5️⃣ Replace climate commitments with AI marketing speak
6️⃣ Delete your net zero pledge when it becomes inconvenient
The numbers paint a startling picture:
⚡ 26% rise in energy consumption in 2024
📈 11.5 million tonnes of CO2 emissions (roughly the same as Ireland)
Their own 2025 Environmental Report admits these increases are “primarily due to data centre capacity delivery… including for AI.” The irony is that they replaced “carbon neutral since 2007” with a line about applying AI to the environment – whilst AI is the very thing making their climate goals impossible.
Look, Google are still doing some things right – they continue to sign renewable power agreements for hydropower, offshore wind and geothermal. But when your chief investment officer talks about powering data centres with “incredibly clean” coal, and your CEO turns up to Trump’s inauguration with a $1 million donation in hand… It’s pretty clear where the priorities lie.
More than 150 comments followed, including this one from me, complete with a link to Robert Bryce’s Renewable Rejection Database (1,123 projects and counting).
But if this is good for investors and broader society (wind and solar are not economical or ecological).
The best comment might have come from Thomas Marihart:
What many don’t realize is that the green agenda was never about saving the planet, it was about making money and reducing competition by increasing barriers for other companies to try to compete with them in the first place.
Now that they have unrivaled status, and are now so far in front of everyone else with such advantage, they really don’t care about being green or virtue signaling anymore, as it’s getting in the way of their expansion plans to build data centers, and making more and more money faster than ever before.
Social media was a valuable tool for pushing the narrative though and people across the board bought it hook line and sinker.
A wise but departed man named George Carlin, summarized the whole scheme quite succinctly with more than a few laughs years ago… Here’s your refresher course about what reality really is.
Final Comment
The new reality–the exodus from climate ESG/DEI, etc.–is now a stampede. (See my previous post on the demise of the Net Zero Banking Alliance). It is past time for the climate activists to understand why. And to ditch their presuppositions that CO2 emissions are worth trying to mitigate. It is (past) adaptation time.