Satya Nadella explains Microsoft's plan to become carbon negative will follow facts — not hype

• Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella explains the company will let the facts speak for themselves in the battle to fight climate change.
• Environmental activities argue Microsoft’s attempts to appear green contradict its business partnership with oil companies that use its cloud servers.
• Nadella explains how fossil fuel producing companies need to be kept in the loop for energy transition to occur.

Microsoft announced its plan to go carbon negative by 2030 last week. To reduce its own carbon footprint and of its clients, the tech giant announced a $1 billion climate innovation fund to boost the development of climate saving technologies.

When Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella asked what he believes to be the best method to battle climate change, he told Bloomberg, "We’ve asked our team not be dogmatic — to let the facts speak for themselves. One of the things I do want to think about is what the solutions that are needed for the world."

In addition to going carbon negative by 2030, Microsoft also plans to remove its historical carbon footprint by 2050. That means eliminating all the carbon emissions from Microsoft’s projects dating back to 1950 when the company was initially founded.

How Microsoft plans on becoming carbon negative
As part of Microsoft’s plan to become carbon negative by 2030, it plans to transition its data centres to use renewable energy. Data centres and the servers within are what drive the company’s cloud business — Azure and Microsoft 365.

Microsoft’s most recent data centre in Sweden runs exclusively on renewable energy and will be used as the model for others around the world.

"The commitment to being carbon negative by 2030 means that we will now have to make sure that all our data centre operations are first consuming renewable energy," said Nadella.

However, he explained that progress would not be linear or on a year-over-year basis. Instead, big leaps will largely depend on technological breakthroughs.

No one company is going to solve climate change
The aim of the billion-dollar fund isn’t just to support Microsoft’s technology, but to also back the others who’re working on changes.

"When it comes to a billion-dollar fund, we do need real breakthroughs. No one company is going to do this," said Nadella.

Although Microsoft is looking to help emerging economies, its plans to roll out renewable energy data farms are initially planned for northern Europe, followed by the rest of Europe and then North America — with nothing concrete on the books for Asian, African and South American countries.

"To fund a wind project in the developed world, it doesn’t need financing support, but perhaps some of the more riskier projects in the emerging world are going to need some more market support," explained Nadella.

The dichotomy of becoming carbon neutral and giving tech to oil companies

Microsoft’s plan to go carbon negative has been criticised by environmental activists for being a publicity stunt. They claim that Microsoft’s measures are in contradiction with the company doing business and providing cloud space to big oil giants.

"Energy transition is going to have participants from the fossil fuel industry to help with it. They’re committing a lot of dollars to new innovations," defended Nadella.

He explained that using cloud servers, in itself, is a way for the companies to reduce their carbon footprint. He added that energy transition from polluting sources of energy to sustainable ones will take time.

Going forward, Microsoft may also look for advice from Bill Gates and cooperation with some of his initiatives to help the environment. Nadella claims that given the size of climate change, big measures need to be taken within this decade.

"We [Microsoft] definitely have a line of sight for how we’re going to get there," he said.