Google and Amazon released their latest sustainability reports, and the numbers show a clear trend: AI is making it harder for both companies to meet their net zero targets. Google's total carbon emissions rose 25% year over year, while Amazon's increased 16%. The main driver is not just electricity for data centers, but the construction and manufacturing behind them. Scope 3 emissions from building data centers, buying GPUs, and producing semiconductors are growing fast. Both companies still buy a lot of renewable power, but they are also turning to natural gas plants to keep up with AI demand. The article breaks down where the new emissions are coming from. For Google, Scope 3 emissions from capital goods like data center construction and hardware purchases have doubled since 2019. Amazon added more than 1.2 GW of data center capacity in Q4 2025 alone. The steel, cement, and semiconductor supply chains are all heavy emitters, and many chip factories run on fossil-heavy grids in Asia. The piece argues that meeting net zero pledges will require much more than renewable energy purchases. It will take investment in low carbon steel and cement, plus large volumes of carbon removal credits. The AI boom is making that path steeper for both companies.
