- Google’s data centers used 30.8 million MWh of electricity in 2024
- That’s around a 2x increase from 2020, and 7x from 2014
- Google claims data center emissions fell by 12% year-over-year
Google has published its latest Sustainability Report, revealing how it is becoming increasingly apparent the desire for cloud and AI services is causing huge spikes in electricity demand.
The company says it used around 32.1 million MWh in 2024, 30.8 million MWh of which was consumed by its data centers – a staggering 95.8% of its total consumption, and more than double the amount of energy its data centers used in 2020 (14.4 million MWh), just before the explosion of AI tools adoption to consumers on a huge scale.
Looking back even further, Google’s data centers used an estimated four million MWh of electricity in 2014, marking a colossal 7x increase over the course of the past decade.
96% of Google’s energy consumption is from data centers
The report added the total electricity consumption for Google rose 27% year-over-year in 2024, following a 17% increase announced in its 2023 report.
However the company stressed it’s making good progress towards cleaning up its energy supply despite the huge growth.
Despite increasing demand, data center energy emissions were reduced by 12% in 2024 through a combination of clean energy initiatives and data center efficiency improvements.
The amount of compute per unit of electricity has risen by around 6x over the past five years, with 2024 power usage effectiveness closing in on the theoretical minimum of 1.0 – in 2024, it was 1.09.
Google explained that, at this scale, even a 0.01 improvement could have considerable positive consequences.
Moreover, Google maintains 100% renewable energy matching globally – something that it’s been doing since 2018. The report details how clean energy purchases in 2024 avoided 8.2 million metric tons of CO2e emissions.
The company recently signed 60 new contracts worth around eight gigawatts in new clean energy, including a geothermal plant in Nevada, solar projects in South Carolina and Oklahoma, and upcoming nuclear reactors.
Although Google continues to make meaningful progress, increasing demand highlights the challenges that the tech giant faces. Looking ahead, Google is piloting carbon-intelligent computing to shift compute tasks to cleaner regions or times.
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