Google has announced in a blog post that it is going to launch the "Carbon Footprint for Google Workspace" in 2023.
The upcoming feature is an expansion of the search giant's "Carbon Footprint for Google Cloud" calculator, which was introduced in 2021.
Google's Carbon Footprint Workspace
According to Gizmodo, Google's new feature will allow companies that use Google Workspace to quantify the greenhouse gas emissions that are connected to their usage of Google services such as Drive, Gmail, and Meet.
The carbon footprint calculator will include both the direct emissions from Google's energy usage and the less direct ones.
How the Calculator Works
All the things that you type using Google's services are stored in a server that recalls them online and files them via a supply of electricity. With the new feature, the search giant will show companies the overall climate impact of their portion of the servers.
The tool was announced together with other initiatives ahead of the Google Cloud Sustainability Summit.
The companies that want to get an accurate calculation of their total emissions, this tool will be very helpful.
However, Google did not specify what it wanted companies to do with the results and what they can do to lower their emissions.
Aside from the Workspace carbon calculator, the search giant also announced a new energy and emissions tracking tool, and new sustainability-focused partnerships.
The company also stated that it will be launched an option for Google Cloud users to source their server storage from low-carbon locations.
Companies can choose to check a box that restricts their Cloud service to those generated in a select group of places powered by renewables.
Google's Climate Change Pledge
In 2020, Google has made one of the most ambitious environmental commitments out of all of the tech giants. It has promised that it will work to run its operations purely on carbon-free energy by 2030, according to The Verge.
It has also announced that it has purchased enough carbon offset to cancel out all of the planet-heating carbon dioxide emissions that the company has released since it was launched in 1998.
In 2007, Google has been carbon neutral, which means that it offsets the emissions it generates from burning fossil fuels by investing in renewable energy projects or other initiatives that draw carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and into its storage, according to Bloomberg.
However, relying on offsets does not actually absolve Google out of fossil fuels. The company released 4.9 million metric tons of greenhouse gases in 2108, which is the amount that is more than 1 million passenger cars put out in just a year.
Google's pledge announcement came after California continues to suffer from the smoke that comes from blazes, and it is made much worse because of climate change.
Google CEO Sundar Pichai said that the company has until 2030 to chart a sustainable cause of Earth or we may all "face the worst consequences of climate change."
Pichai added that we are already feeling the impacts from the wildfires in the United States to flooding in many parts of the world.
Related Article: Google is Tracking Weather Patterns to Make Its Data Centers More Environment Friendly
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Written by Sophie Webster
