Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

techradar.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 73 posts

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#51

Post by tgtweak »

I think the reality is that they are running the workloads of all of the customers of GCP and Azure collectively - and provided they're offsetting those emissions and hosting them with green energy where possible - it should be a net win for the environment that they're hosting this much infra. It also encourages prioritization on systematic efficiency improvements where possible. I think google was one of the first providers to publish and push for PUAs of their datacenters close to 1.0.

They also have programs in place for e-waste recycling and safe refrigerant destruction where it is available - things that you will not see in colocation-type facilities.

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#52

Post by jraph »

constantcrying wrote: post #47
grecy wrote: post #2

Given how wildly profitable they are, we should be passing laws that they must produce X % of their power needs from renewable sources, where X approaches 100%. This would be a jobs program that would also help the planet. Win win. Investors would make slightly less money in the short term, but our grandchildren will be able to live. I think that is a good trade off.

It is ridiculous to place these demands on energy consumers. Microsoft and Google aren't operating heir own powerplants to generate energy in the quantities they need (some other companies, e.g. VW partially do), for that they are relying on other companies, which sell them their energy. If and only if those other companies are able and willing to produce the required energy mix, then the desired mix used downstream…

There's nothing obvious here.

The energy provider could say "why should I be the one eating the cost of providing sustainable energy?".

The ones consuming energy also need to take their responsibilities. "When we think that it would suffice people didn't buy it for it not to sell!" (Coluche).

In fact, this is a collective issue we are all part of (including as individuals: we use the services consuming energy).

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#53

Post by grecy »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #21
em500 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Investors would make slightly less money in the short term Why do you assume that the tax incidence falls on investors, rather than on customers and/or employees? With sales tax or VAT people tend to automatically assume 100% passthrough (so that the incidence falls completely on customers/consumers) even though they're also collected by companies. In reality taxes are borne by a combination of customers/employees/…

> taxes are borne by a combination of customers/employees/owners And any green tax would be trivial for Google to add as a line item on invoices: it’s so defensible.

> In reality taxes are borne by a combination of customers/employees/owners

That depends entirely on where the money comes from.

If the company does not reduce profit, then yes, they must raise prices and/or reduce employee salaries.

But if we are willing to put the taboo topic of reducing profits on the table, profit can just be reduced without any impact to customers or employees. I realize this kind of talk is blasphemy, but it clearly needs to be done.

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#54

Post by JumpCrisscross »

grecy wrote: post #53
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> taxes are borne by a combination of customers/employees/owners And any green tax would be trivial for Google to add as a line item on invoices: it’s so defensible.

> In reality taxes are borne by a combination of customers/employees/owners That depends entirely on where the money comes from. If the company does not reduce profit, then yes, they must raise prices and/or reduce employee salaries. But if we are willing to put the taboo topic of reducing profits on the table, profit can just be reduced without any impact to customers or employees. I realize this kind of talk is bla…

> if we are willing to put the taboo topic of reducing profits on the table, profit can just be reduced without any impact to customers or employees

We’ve capped profits in various industries before. The benefits didn’t flow to customers and employees equally, they flowed to specific employees and specific customers. (You also see R&D grind to a halt.)

There isn’t a clean technical solution to this social problem, that of redistributing wealth indirectly. At the end of the day, if you want investors’ profits, you have to take them directly.

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#55

Post by tehmillhouse »

grecy wrote: post #2

Given how wildly profitable they are, we should be passing laws that they must produce X % of their power needs from renewable sources, where X approaches 100%. This would be a jobs program that would also help the planet. Win win. Investors would make slightly less money in the short term, but our grandchildren will be able to live. I think that is a good trade off.

I'm not sure if investors will agree. The general way the stock market works heavily favors shortsighted thinking. They'll say après moi, le déluge and then package the déluge up into sellable financial instruments.

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#56

Post by dr_kiszonka »

Something bugs me about this framing. I see that it can be useful, but Google's power consumption is not independent of, e.g., Spain's consumption. Big tech's power consumption is, largely, our power consumption minus development (which, like AI, can be high).

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#57

Post by jsnell »

edhelas wrote: post #44
jsnell wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does it matter whether e.g. a hospital runs on renewable energy or not? Why is "industry" good but "data centers" are bad? If some companies care enough about their image to pay extra to buy green energy, that's good! It makes that production more profitable, and encourages more such production to be built faster. Why are you trying to disincentivize that with "greenwashing" slurs?

Because the global goal of all that is the CO2 emissions that we emit __today__. I'm perfectly fine that we start big plans to build many new nuclear and renewable plants, but __today__ we need to emit less CO2, now. CO2 just add up in the atmosphere and don't degrade in the time we have. SO, in the quota we need to respect, I prefer to ensure that the today capacity we have of "clean energy" are used for a proper us…

Oh, so your objection isn't to them buying green energy, it's to them buying electricity at all?

Google and Microsoft are clearly more effective users of energy than many other commercial users, i.e. creating more value per watt spent. In a situation where you're going to snap your fingers and killing companies or entire industries by refusing to sell them electricity, you don't want to go for the efficient energy users. You want to go after the ones where the energy is adding the least marginal value.

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#58

Post by s1artibartfast »

nicolaslem wrote: post #45
thinkindie wrote: post #15

Personally, I'm not much concerned about their energy consumption per se but rather by their energy mix. I would be more than fine if they had all their energy sourced from solar panels and wind turbines.

Since electricity is fungible at the continent scale, it only makes sense to look at the energy mix of society at large. Google could pay a premium to buy only renewable energy from the grid and have an impressive 100% green energy mix, simply displacing emission to the rest of us.

production isnt zero sum. If google buys up all the renewable power, more will be installed to supply green homeowners in Berkeley.

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#59

Post by s1artibartfast »

energy123 wrote: post #27
mrweasel wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This could/should(?) be fixed by taxing CO2 emissions. I'm not sure what it works in e.g. the US, but some countries have this stupid idea that electricity prices have a build in CO2 tax, but applied to all consumptions, not just that produced by CO2 emitting sources. Let's say Microsoft could save 25% on their electricity bill by consuming power from wind farms, I think they'd work out a way to do more AI training w…

The ship has sailed on carbon taxes. It's good policy but voters don't like it, so politicians will never do it. Voters have shown to be okay with direct subsidies and permitting reform, so that's what we must do out of sheer pragmatism.

find something related to do with the carbon tax, and more people would vote for it.

Re: Google and Microsoft now each consume more power than some fairly big countries

#60

Post by constantcrying »

jraph wrote: post #52
constantcrying wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is ridiculous to place these demands on energy consumers. Microsoft and Google aren't operating heir own powerplants to generate energy in the quantities they need (some other companies, e.g. VW partially do), for that they are relying on other companies, which sell them their energy. If and only if those other companies are able and willing to produce the required energy mix, then the desired mix used downstream…

There's nothing obvious here. The energy provider could say "why should I be the one eating the cost of providing sustainable energy?". The ones consuming energy also need to take their responsibilities. "When we think that it would suffice people didn't buy it for it not to sell!" (Coluche). In fact, this is a collective issue we are all part of (including as individuals: we use the services consuming energy).

>The energy provider could say "why should I be the one eating the cost of providing sustainable energy?".

Where did you get that from? He could also force the additional cost to the companies.

>The ones consuming energy also need to take their responsibilities. "When we think that it would suffice people didn't buy it for it not to sell!" (Coluche).

You can not buy energy which doesn't exist. If less renewable energy is produced than the consumer needs, the legally required energy mix is impossible. Obviously the alonly person which can change which energy is produced is the provider.

>In fact, this is a collective issue we are all part of (including as individuals: we use the services consuming energy).

There is exactly one group of people responsible for the energy mix. The energy providers. Obviously any change can only come from them and demanding change from anyone, without first demanding change from the providers is obviously ridiculous.

Post reply on HN