Amsterdam, Netherlands - NVIDIA, the world's most valuable company by market capitalisation, has been using greenwashing tricks to misleadingly mask its staggering emissions impacts, finds a new analysis. According to the briefing, NVIDIA's indirect emissions have risen 725% since 2020[1], and it is estimated that undisclosed emissions from the use of sold chips could be up to double that.
Avex Li, Project Lead for Greenpeace East Asia's AI Supply Chain Campaign, said:
"NVIDIA wants the world to believe that AI will solve the climate crisis, while ignoring the rapidly growing emissions behind its own products and billion-dollar supply chain networks. As one of the world's biggest beneficiaries and a key player in the AI frenzy, with immense market power, cash flow, and influence, NVIDIA cannot distance itself from the real-world environmental impacts of its business."
The briefing, written by analyst and lead author Ketan Joshi and a consortium of civil society groups, including Greenpeace International, Beyond Fossil Fuels, Friends of the Earth, Green Screen Coalition, Stand.Earth, Kairos Fellowship, and Climate Action Against Disinformation, is the first analysis of greenwashing-style statements commonly used by NVIDIA.[2]
NVIDIA's business lies primarily in chips manufactured in East Asia and sold across the world, consuming vast amounts of energy throughout their lifecycle[3]. At the end of the line, they are largely used in new, similarly energy- and water-hungry data centre buildings, mainly for the purpose of operating generative AI[4]. Both pillars of this business model share a common outcome: they exacerbate the climate crisis and adversely affect local communities[5].
Xueying Wu, campaigner on Big Tech for Greenpeace International, added:
"NVIDIA is driving a system of tech colonialism: monopolising the profits of AI while offloading its ecological impacts onto the Global Majority. Meanwhile, NVIDIA together with other tech giants is inflating the AI bubble that gambles with global financial stability, concentrating more and more power in tech corporations' hands."
Greenpeace demands tech serving the public good.More specifically, NVIDIA must accelerate the energy transition by:
- investing deeply in new/additional renewable energy globally
- expanding its 100% renewable energy target from its own corporate operations to cover its entire manufacturing supply chain by 2030, in places like Taiwan in East Asia
