Google’s 2025 sustainability numbers show how quickly AI infrastructure is changing the energy profile of major technology companies. The company reported a 37 percent rise in annual electricity consumption in 2025, while also saying its clean energy purchases helped keep operational carbon emissions down.
AI infrastructure is driving a bigger power footprint
The sharp increase in electricity use was tied to continued growth across Google Cloud, YouTube video streaming, and the construction and operation of data centers that support AI products and services. Google said total electricity usage has increased by more than 250 percent since 2019.
The 2025 jump also followed another large increase. Google’s total electricity consumption grew by 27 percent in 2024, making the 37 percent increase in 2025 part of a broader pattern rather than a one-year anomaly.
Data centers accounted for the bulk of the demand. Google’s data centers used more than 42 million megawatt-hours of electricity in 2025, up from 30.6 million megawatt-hours in 2024. That level of data center energy usage rivals the electricity consumption of entire countries such as New Zealand, Denmark, and Nigeria.
Clean energy helped, but did not erase the challenge
Google reported that operational emissions fell by 2 percent during the same year that electricity consumption surged. The company framed that result as a sign that emissions can be separated, at least in part, from growth in power demand.
Still, Google’s own report described the task ahead as uneven. The company wrote:
“While the path to achieving our climate ambitions will not be linear—given our AI infrastructure buildout is currently accelerating faster than the grid is decarbonizing—we remain focused on scaling abundant and affordable clean power globally and progressing technological innovations that drive down emissions across our operations and the broader industry,”
The central tension is clear. Google can buy large amounts of clean energy and invest in cleaner power, but the AI infrastructure buildout is moving faster than the grid is becoming carbon-free.
Google said it will need more clean energy investments and closer partnerships with local stakeholders in the years ahead. That point matters because data centers draw power from real local grids, not from a global average.
Supply chain emissions moved in the wrong direction
The operational emissions figure was not the whole climate picture. Google also said supply chain emissions from contracted manufacturers and suppliers grew by 25 percent.
The company attributed that increase to “an Asia-Pacific supply chain operating on grids that remain undersupplied with carbon-free energy.” As a result, Google reported that total “ambition-based emissions” increased by 18 percent between 2024 and 2025.
Google’s overall carbon footprint for 2025 was about 14.5 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent. Compared with emissions by country, that would place Google somewhere between Ivory Coast and Panama at about 100th place.
These numbers show why operational emissions alone can give an incomplete picture. A company can reduce emissions from its own operations while its wider network of suppliers and manufacturers becomes a larger source of climate impact.
The 24/7 carbon-free energy goal is more demanding
Google has matched 100 percent of its electricity consumption with renewable energy purchases across global operations for nine years running. In 2025, its purchase agreements covered 12 gigawatts of “net-new clean energy,” the largest annual total in the company’s history.
But the company also acknowledged a limit in the usual renewable matching model. A company can say it relies on 100 percent renewable power while still drawing electricity from local grids that include fossil fuel generation.
That is why Google says it has renewed focus on a “24/7 carbon-free energy ambition.” This approach uses more detailed accounting, with certificates that represent hourly and local matches for clean energy.
The difference is important. Annual renewable purchases can balance out total consumption over time, but they do not necessarily mean a data center is using carbon-free electricity in every location and every hour.
Google is backing many energy options at once
Michael Thomas, CEO of the Cleanview data platform that tracks renewable energy and data center projects, said Google has become one of the world’s largest investors in clean energy technology. His analysis of Google’s data center power strategy suggests the company has moved toward an “Everything Everywhere All at Once” strategy.
That strategy includes renewables as well as natural gas generation. Google’s broader investments include efforts to commercialize “advanced nuclear, fusion energy, enhanced geothermal, long-duration energy storage, and natural gas with carbon capture and storage.”
The sustainability report highlighted more than $3.8 billion in investments between 2010 and 2025 that are expected to bring 7.5 gigawatts of clean energy online.
At the same time, Thomas pointed in an April 2026 newsletter to Google’s $40 billion investment in Texas data centers, including a campus that could potentially be powered by a 933-megawatt natural gas power plant without carbon capture technology. The plant’s turbines could produce 4.5 million tons of carbon dioxide annually.
A Google spokesperson told Thomas that the company has not yet signed an agreement for how much power Google’s data center might draw from the natural gas plant.
The result is a complicated picture. Google is buying and investing in clean energy at major scale, but its electricity demand is growing quickly, and parts of its supply chain and potential power strategy still point to emissions risks.