How big tech is cleverly evading its responsibility to become carbon neutral through creative accounting practices? Through "Renewable Energy Certificates" (RECs). The data centers of these companies have incredible power requirements which is met through traditional energy sources. What RECs do is that they help these companies to buy credits from renewable energy projects like wind farms. By purchasing RECs, they basically pay for the "environmental benefits" of that wind energy, even though the actual electricity for data centers still comes from coal. On paper, the data center can say it’s using renewable energy as it is supporting renewable projects through RECs, but the reality is that they still use fossil fuels. So, they get the credit for being "green" without directly using green energy AND claim they’re CARBON NEUTRAL without really changing how they operate. Although it may give them short term relief, it is guaranteed to have serious long term implications for all.
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