The soaring electricity demands of data centers and A.I. are straining the grid in some areas, pushing up emissions and slowing the energy transition.
A few weeks ago, I joined a small group of reporters for a wide-ranging conversation with Bill Gates about climate change, its causes and potential solutions. When the topic turned to the issue of just how much energy artificial intelligence was using, Gates was surprisingly sanguine.
When BC first introduced a carbon tax in 2008 the point was to apply it to all emissions causing climate change, but start at a low rate and increase it over time. Yet, as the carbon tax has increased for households at the gas pump and to heat homes, large industrial players—including the oil and gas industry that is causing climate change—have steadily evaded their carbon tax.
B.C. Attorney General Niki Sharma has asked a provincial watchdog to look into a series of bold claims about how an executive at a Canadian oil and gas giant — and former BC NDP political staffer — claimed the company had leveraged political connections to persuade the provincial government to significantly weaken its environmental policies.
The company has removed dozens of documents referencing the technology from its website following passage of a new anti-greenwashing law.
Exxon’s Canadian subsidiary Imperial Oil has deleted from its website a document in which its CEO and chairman Brad Corson claims to investors that carbon capture and storage is “critical” to achieving the “climate goals outlined in the Paris Agreement.”
As power needs of AI push emissions up and put big tech in a bind, companies put their faith in elusive — some say improbable — technologies.
The mighty Columbia River has helped power the American West with hydroelectricity since the days of FDR’s New Deal. But the artificial intelligence revolution will demand more. Much more.
Since its launch in 2021, the Pathways Alliance has used a three-step greenwashing strategy to weaken and delay climate measures, according to new research from a leading international think tank.
According to U.K.-based InfluenceMap, the Pathways Alliance, which represents Canada’s largest fossil fuel companies responsible for 95 per cent of oilsands production, appears to use this three-step plan to keep profit margins of its members healthy as the global energy transition off fossil fuels unfolds.
