Image from Commonwealth Fusion Systems
Google’s recent sustainability report reveals that the company has more than doubled its electricity use in the past four years. In 2024, Google’s data centers used 30.8 million megawatt-hours of electricity, up from 14.4 million megawatt-hours in 2020. In 2024, data centers accounted for 95.8% of the entire company’s electricity use.
While Google reported that their data center emissions decreased by 12% compared to 2023, their overall emissions grew by 11% in that same time.
In 2007, Google set a goal to be carbon neutral, an achievement that becomes more and more difficult as the company’s energy use spirals. Google stopped claiming carbon neutrality in 2023 and is now focused on a new goal of net-zero emissions by 2030. In order to achieve this goal, the company has been investing in a range of energy sources, including geothermal, nuclear and renewables.
Google’s fusion energy deal
Google recently signed one of the first commercial deals for fusion energy with MIT-spinout Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS), a nuclear startup. CFS is backed by Bill Gates’ technology fund, Breakthrough Energy Ventures, and is aiming to produce commercial fusion energy in the 2030s.
The deal is for 200 megawatts of energy, an amount that could power about 75,000 homes, from CFS’s plant in Virginia, roughly half of the expected energy production from the plant. CFS said the figure for the deal was in the multibillions, but did not release an exact amount.
“[This deal] is a pretty big signal to the market that fusion’s coming,” said CFS co-founder and Chief Executive Bob Mumgaard.
In addition to this fusion energy deal, Google has also pledged to buy 500 MW of nuclear fission energy from Kairos Power, a small startup.
Deals like this one could help Google stick to its net-zero by 2030 promise.
Google’s other energy investments
Google has also invested in geothermal power with the startup Fervo Energy and bought a total of 1300 MW of solar energy in the first half of 2025.
In 2024, Google announced it invested $20 billion with Intersect Power and TPG Rise Climate to build carbon-free power plants. The company currently has about 66% of its data center energy consumption powered by carbon-free electricity. However, this varies by location.
