Greenpeace Germany activists protested during NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang's keynote at NVIDIA GTC Conference. The activists projected "NVIDIA, clean up your dirty business" onto the stage and unrolled a banner with the same message referencing the environmental and ethical impact of the AI frenzy, enabled by the massive production of their chips for global markets.
In recent years, Greenpeace organisations have repeatedly exposed the company's climate footprint especially through its outsourced manufacturers powered by dirty fossil fuels and concentrated in East Asia.[1][2]
Benjamin Stephan, Big Tech campaigner at Greenpeace International, said: "While NVIDIA is building an unchecked AI empire no one consented to, people are paying the price. Around the world, communities face damage to water supplies and soil, alongside rising electricity bills because of unchecked expansion of data centres. Meanwhile, the environmental burden of chip manufacturing weighs on communities in East Asia."
NVIDIA, the world's most valuable company by market capitalisation, generating huge profits, plays a central role in the AI investment frenzy. It has partnered with financial institutions to finance more data centres, glossing over both their environmental impacts and the risk of further inflating a financial bubble on the brink of bursting. Greenpeace International is sounding the alarm about this Big Tech expansion, which poses a direct threat to the environment and the global economy.
Referencing recent remarks by NVIDIA's CEO,[3] Stephan said: "The world does not need more 'pain and suffering'. People are already facing multiple crises, from climate change to the rising cost of living. Better technology is possible, if driven by communities' needs and controlled by strong, binding regulation, so that technology serves the public interest rather than further inflating the AI bubble."
Greenpeace International demands that NVIDIA serve the public interest by investing substantially in additional renewable energy capacity. The organisation also calls on the company to extend its 100% renewable energy target beyond its own corporate operations to cover its entire manufacturing supply chain by 2030, including suppliers in key production regions in East Asia.
Finally, Greenpeace International is calling for NVIDIA to implement an independent audit process covering all distributors, subsidiaries and third-party vendors worldwide to ensure that its products are not used in ways that violate human rights and are not incorporated into military equipment.
