They included having zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 banning contracts that enable fossil-fuel extraction and no longer funding think tanks, lobbyists, and politicians who work to undermine climate-change action. Part of Google’s environmental collaboration has been with its own employees, some of whom signed a letter in 2019 asking the company to establish several sustainability goals. The Nest thermostat also prompts people to consider turning down their thermostats at optimal times. “In Google Shopping, you can now see when you’re searching for a hot water heater, it’ll give you prompts to consider a heat-pump water heater,” Brandt said. For example, when someone uses Google Flights to search for airline travel options, the search tool displays the amount of carbon dioxide emissions along with the flight’s price and travel time. Now, in addition to the stand-alone web tool, those energy-saving ideas are incorporated into the company’s consumer-facing efforts including its shopping, flights, and hotels search features and its Nest smart thermostats.
“This was really, I think, our first visible step in thinking about how do we use technology to make the sustainable choice the easiest choice,” she said. The site has evolved to its current iteration that provides tips to people interested in reducing food, water, and energy waste and prolonging the life of consumer products. In 2018, Google teamed up with the California Academy of Sciences and the Ellen MacArthur Foundation to create an interactive online tool called Your Plan, Your Planet. And its Nest smart thermostats can affect daily household energy-use decisions. These companies’ products and services are already widespread in developed nations, but Google holds a unique spot in the sustainability push because of its involvement in people’s everyday decisions about transportation through Google Maps and Google Flights. Apple’s goal is to be carbon-neutral across its supply chain and products by 2030, adding to the carbon neutrality it already claims for its global operations. Amazon, a big player in the energy-hungry world of data centers, aims for net zero by 2040. Microsoft is also a leader, aiming to be carbon-negative by that year. With its 2030 net-zero goal, Google has one of the most aggressive sustainability plans among Big Tech companies. She heads sustainability across the company’s global operations, products and supply chain, coordinating those efforts with the company’s data center, real estate, and product teams. These efforts are overseen by chief sustainability officer Kate Brandt, who headed the Obama administration’s sustainability efforts in 20 before taking a job as sustainability lead with Google. Google’s sustainability efforts span its offerings, ranging from machine learning to help cool its data centers to smart thermostats that conserve home energy.
While it isn’t as impactful as electrifying the transportation sector, the initiative illustrates Google’s three-pillar approach to climate change: decarbonizing its operations and supply chain, using its technology and data to enable cities and businesses to calculate their carbon footprints, and helping consumers make sustainable choices. That’s the equivalent of getting 100,000 fuel-burning cars off the road. The app feature has reduced greenhouse gas emissions by more than 500,000 metric tons, the company said last week.
The efforts have the added benefits of boosting the company’s standing with investors who prioritize environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) standards. Eco-routing, which displays a small leaf next to the Google Maps directions with the lowest carbon footprint, is just one of many initiatives Google has launched to help others achieve “deep decarbonization” as it works toward its own net-zero emissions target in 2030.
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