Chinese tech firms not adopting clean energy 'fast enough' to show commitment: Greenpeace

A report by an environmental group Greenpeace on Wednesday said that China's tech organisations are not adopting clean energy "fast enough" to show their commitment towards carbon neutrality.

The report by Greenpeace said that China's data centre sector is a main and rising source of CO2 emissions and the energy consumption from this industry is on course to rise 66 per cent between 2019 and 2023.

Watch |

In 2018, Chinese data centres were 73 per cent powered by coal, the report said, adding that by 2023, the electricity consumption from the sector is set to compete with Australia.

However, in Greenpeace's latest rankings, Chinese gaming giant Tencent took the top spot in the country's tech sector amongst the cloud providers to tackle carbon emissions and procuring from renewable sources.

Thirteen of China's 22 biggest tech companies have now agreed to actively procure renewable energy, a significant rise from just eight companies in 2019.

However, the report said that only two out of these companies, namely Baidu and Chindata have renewable energy usage rates of more than three per cent.

Greenpeace urged internet and data centre organisations to target 100 per cent renewable energy use and aim carbon neutrality by the end of 2030.