One of the largest technology companies in the world needs more carbon credits. And they are going to provide the funding for millions of new trees to be planted in order to get them.
What’s happening:
- Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) has announced a new agreement with carbon credit project developer Ponterra to purchase 1.6M carbon removal credits
Why it matters:
- The new deal between Microsoft and Ponterra is one of the largest ever fully financed carbon credit removal projects in Central America
By the numbers:
- The reforestation project is located in Panama and spans more than 10,000 hectares
- Ponterra is aiming to remove approximately 3.2M tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere throughout the lifespan of the project
- Over 6M trees are expected to be planted on land that has been degraded by cattle and livestock farming
Going deeper:
- The rise of artificial intelligence cloud computing and the boom in new data centre infrastructure has caused Microsoft’s total carbon emissions to rise significantly, which has accelerated their need to buy more carbon credits to offset their operations
- Microsoft recently also announced one of the largest deals ever done by a publicly traded company to build out new renewable energy infrastructure to provide power for their data centres in North America and Europe
The intrigue:
- The enormous power consumption and carbon emissions caused by data centres is one of the reasons why Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) recently purchase a data centre campus located in Pennsylvania that is powered entirely by nuclear energy
