GCP – Reflections from COP28: To drive meaningful climate solutions, it’s all tech on deck

The UAE Consensus agreement that was signed earlier this week at the conclusion of COP28 was not what many participants had hoped for, but it is more than many of us expected. While it failed to definitively call for the phase-out of fossil fuels, it did land agreement on a range of critical issues — from scaling renewables, funding for loss and damage, and more. Still, the risk of catastrophic climate change is high, and the pressure to effect meaningful change continues to fall on individuals and the private sector.

Thankfully, as we wrote over the past two weeks, there’s a lot that businesses and individuals can do. Over the course of 14 blogs, we detailed the numerous ways that Google, Google Cloud and our partners are curtailing our own carbon footprints, and outlined many ways our customers are doing the same, using a variety of techniques, tools and technologies. On the technology front, the rise of generative AI in particular is enabling new ways of surfacing climate-relevant information and driving climate-friendly actions.

To recap, here’s a summary of what we wrote about over the course of the conference:

On Day 1, Adaire Fox-Martin and I, Justin Keeble, laid out our vision for improving access to climate data (e.g., participating in the Net Zero Data Public Utility), building a climate tech ecosystem, and unlocking the power of geospatial analysis.On Day 2, the first-ever COP28 Health Day, Googlers Phil Davis and Daniel Elkabetz highlighted how environmental data can raise awareness, help citizens make better decisions, and spur adoption of solutions for better climate health.On Day 3, as the COP28 community pondered finance and trade, Kevin Ichhpurani and Denise Pearl discussed how partners can adopt programs in Google Cloud Ready – Sustainability catalog to help their customers identify and deploy better solutions.Likewise, EMEA Googlers Tara Brady and Jackie Pynadath highlighted how Google Cloud financial services customers are using generative AI to fund climate transition initiatives.For Day 5, Energy and Industry Day, Google Cloud Consulting leader Lee Moore and Poki Chui showed how businesses are decarbonizing their supply chains and helping consumers make enlightened choices.On Day 6, Urbanization and Transport Day, Umesh Vemuri and Jennifer Werthwein showed off examples of Google Cloud automotive customers using AI to, um, drive innovation in automobile design, supply chain, power and mobility.Denise Pearl then took the pen with our partner mCloud to discuss how we, in addition to shifting away from carbon-based energy, are actually using less energy to begin with.We then heard from the Google Cloud Office of the CTO, where Will Grannis and Jen Bennett relayed the lessons they’ve learned from talking to CTOs about sustainability.In honor of Day 9, Nature Day, Chris Lindsay and Charlotte Hutchinson talked about how geospatial analytics and solutions built on top of Google Earth Engine are helping partners preserve the natural world.Then, Yael Maguire and Eugene Yeh of our Geo Sustainability team looked at the new European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), and how to comply with it using geospatial data and tools.In honor of Day 10, Food, Agriculture and Water Day, Karan Bajwa and Leah Kaplan provided a view from Google Cloud Asia at how Google Earth Engine and AI can support sustainable agriculture; andCarrie Tharp and Prue Mackenzie from the Industries team examined how generative AI can encourage healthier food systems.Product management leads Gabe Monroy and Cynthia Wu described how Google Cloud tools like Carbon Footprint are helping companies decarbonize their cloud footprints; andFinally, Michael Clark and Diane Chaleff shared techniques that software builders can use to bolster sustainable software design, and encourage end users to make better choices from their apps.

This is just a small sample of the many things that we are doing to address the climate crisis, both in our own operations, and through technologies that our customers can use to drive their own efforts. We hope that you take the time to read about what Google Cloud customers and partners are doing to accelerate action on climate, and that you will take inspiration in them for your own business transformation. You can also learn more about Google’s sustainability efforts, and keep up-to-date on Google Cloud’s sustainability news. See you next year for COP29.