Climate rift opens between Amazon and rivals in row over data centre power

Amazon has been accused of pressuring a leading clean energy group by raising the prospect of withdrawing funding, amid a furious debate over plans that would make it harder for Big Tech “hyperscalers” to hit their climate targets.

The US tech giant met with Microsoft, Meta, Google and energy industry bodies during an advisory board meeting last month of clean energy buyer and seller group RE-Source, according to several attendees.

At the meeting, tech groups present clashed over a proposal by the world’s leading authority on carbon accounting, the Greenhouse Gas Protocol, to tighten disclosure rules on power emissions.

The reform would likely make it harder for tech groups to suggest data centre growth can be powered by clean energy.

Google backed the change. But Amazon sustainability director Jake Oster opposed the move and questioned how his company could justify financing RE-Source without adopting a position on the matter, four attendees told the FT.

A representative for WindEurope, one of RE-Source’s co-founders, responded that Oster’s comments sounded like a commercial “threat”, according to two attendees.

A person close to Amazon said that Oster had not threatened to withdraw funding but had “explained that he would expect questions why Amazon is financially supporting an organisation that is not engaging on an issue that is core to its purpose.”

He had “insisted that RE-Source gauge the perspective of its members . . . and should not remain neutral on an issue of critical importance to corporate buyers of carbon-free energy.” 

RE-Source said that it was “only fair and normal” that its members comment on the accounting reform.

Amazon’s annual contribution to RE-Source, a major European advocacy and networking initiative that facilitates deal making between clean energy buyers and sellers, is estimated at around €100,000, according to people familiar with the matter. They added that a loss of funding would be a blow to the group’s operations.

The argument reveals the increasingly contentious debate over how Big Tech meets ambitious climate goals, while also spending billions of dollars in the race to build power-hungry AI infrastructure.

Amazon, Meta and Google power many of their data centres from fossil-fuel heavy grids, but say they “match” their energy use with 100 per cent renewable energy. Microsoft has said it aimed to do this by 2025.

Tech companies typically cancel out their annual emissions from coal, oil and gas by investing in deals for wind, solar and hydro power, often through the use of “renewable energy credits” that vary in price and quality.

For example, a data centre running through the night in Texas and powered by burning gas and coal can offset its greenhouse gas emissions thanks to certificates issued when solar energy is purchased during the day in California — even though the two states do not typically trade physical electricity.

The Greenhouse Gas Protocol has suggested that, in future, investments in power supply should roughly match the time and place of power consumption, ensuring reported data on greenhouse gas emissions from power are “accurate, comparable and decision-useful”.

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The Emissions First Partnership, a lobby group founded by companies including Amazon and Meta, argues that so-called 24/7 matching should be optional, and has proposed an alternative technique based on working out emissions “avoided” by clean energy.

“It’s just nonsense to say that there’s an AI emissions crisis,” said Gavin McCormick, executive director of WattTime, a member of the lobby group, at an industry event last month. “What we’re seeing is that to solve a crisis that isn’t there, there’s increasingly a bit of a desperation move happening.”

The EU, California and the International Financial Reporting Standards all draw on the voluntary protocol in their guidelines on how companies should disclose their carbon footprints.

Meta and Google did not respond to requests for comment. Microsoft declined to comment.

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