Stefan Mileschin

I'm Spartacus

Activists inside Google are calling on management to ditch deals with oil and gas companies, the latest flare-up inside the technology giant.

More than 1,100 workers asked Google Chief Financial Officer Ruth Porat to release a "company-wide climate plan" that commits to cutting carbon emissions entirely.

The letter also asks Google to drop contracts that "enable or accelerate the extraction of fossil fuels". Since 2017, Google's cloud-computing unit has disclosed contracts with oil-services giant Schlumberger, Chevron, and French energy company Total SA. Saudi Arabia's Aramco, the world's largest oil company, announced a tentative cloud deal with Google last year, although the internet giant has never confirmed the partnership.

Ike McCreery, an engineer in Google's cloud division said that if Google is going to confront its share of responsibility for the climate crisis, that means not helping oil and gas companies extract fossil fuels.

"This is a moment in history that requires urgent and decisive action." Google has touted its green credentials for years. The company announced the largest ever corporate purchase of renewable energy in September. Starting in 2017, the company has matched the electricity bill from its massive data centres with equal purchases from renewable energy sources.

The Google employee letter also asks the company not to do business with US immigration authorities, "arguing that more people are being forced to move across borders due to climate change."

US Customs and Border Protection is testing a Google cloud service called Anthos, which lets organizations use multiple cloud providers at once.

https://fudzilla.com/news/49727-goog...t-over-big-oil