Microsoft and other US tech companies successfully lobbied the EU to conceal the environmental impact of their datacentres, an investigation has revealed, with language almost verbatim from their demands to block a database of green metrics incorporated into EU regulations.
The secrecy provision, which the European Commission added to its proposal almost verbatim after industry lobbying in 2024, obstructs scrutiny of the pollution emitted by individual datacentres. It provides researchers only with national-level summaries of their energy footprints.
The growth of AI chatbots has driven a boom in the construction of chip-filled warehouses with a substantial power demand, partially met by burning fossil gas. Legal experts warn that the broad confidentiality clause might violate EU transparency rules and the Aarhus convention on public access to environmental information.
“In two decades, I cannot recall a comparable case,” said Prof Jerzy Jendrośka, who spent 19 years on the body overseeing the convention and teaches environmental law at the University of Opole in Poland. “This clearly seems not to be in line with the convention.”
Documents obtained by Investigate Europe, an independent journalism cooperative that led the research in collaboration with the Guardian and other media partners, reveal that the rules have already been used to shield datacentres from scrutiny.
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In an email citing the secrecy clause last year, a senior commission official reminded national authorities of their obligation to “keep confidential all information and key performance indicators for individual datacentres”.
“It is really important to reiterate this point as the commission has already received various requests for access to documents by the media or the public regarding the data,” the official said. “All these requests have been so far refused.”
The US and China have led the global AI boom, but even in Europe, datacentres are being built at a rapid pace. The EU aims to triple its datacentre capacity in the next five to seven years as it seeks to establish itself as a global leader in artificial intelligence.
In an effort to increase transparency, the commission updated its energy efficiency directive in 2023, requiring datacentre operators to report data on key performance indicators. In further guidance, it suggested publishing “aggregated” environmental metrics.
However, during public consultations in January 2024, tech companies advocated classifying all individual datacentre information as confidential, citing commercial interests. This demand means the data cannot be accessed through freedom of information requests.
The final version of the article, differing by only a couple of words from industry demands, states, “the commission and member states concerned shall keep confidential all information and key performance indicators for individual datacentres that are communicated to the database … Such information shall be considered confidential information affecting the commercial interests of operators and owners of datacentres.”
Industry submissions during the public consultation show that the groups lobbying for the change include Microsoft; DigitalEurope, an industry organization whose members include Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and Meta; and Video Games Europe, whose members include Microsoft and Netflix.
Ben Youriev, a researcher at InfluenceMap, a non-profit organization that tracks corporate lobbying, said it exemplified how the tech sector is grappling with a shift toward increased energy usage.
He said: “Where the industry was previously outspoken in its support for clean energy and emissions reductions, many firms have since fallen silent. Instead, they appear to be prioritizing the rapid build-out of datacentre infrastructure globally over supporting clean energy and rapid emissions reductions.”
DigitalEurope did not respond to a request for comment. The commission and Video Games Europe declined to comment.
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Microsoft said it supports greater transparency around datacentres as sustainability disclosures can help drive better outcomes and build public trust. A spokesperson stated: “We are taking further steps to increase openness while protecting confidential business information.”
The EU executive considers the regulation a first step toward creating a common EU rating scheme for datacentres. In a second phase, for which public consultation on the legislation ends this month, it plans to publish sustainability scores from the database to “make it easier to compare different datacentres in the same region and promote new designs or appropriate efficiency in datacentres”. Under the current proposals, the majority of what operators report would remain confidential.
The commission’s internal position, according to sources close to the matter, is that making each datacentre’s information public might cause operators to stop reporting their sustainability metrics. However, EU data indicates that only 36% of eligible datacentres have complied with the existing reporting requirements.
The industry has “a real interest in keeping the numbers hidden”, said Alex de Vries-Gao, a researcher at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, who has mostly had to rely on aggregated data when attempting to quantify the environmental impact of AI.
“Public information is extremely limited. You typically have to bend over backward to derive any numbers,” he said.
The EU is obligated under the Aarhus convention to ensure that environmental information is systematically made available by the authorities to the public.
Luc Lavrysen, the former president of the Belgian constitutional court and emeritus professor of environmental law at Ghent University, stated the confidentiality clause “is clearly in violation” of EU transparency rules and the Aarhus convention.
Kristina Irion, an associate professor in information law at the University of Amsterdam, reached the same conclusion. She said the “sweeping presumption of confidentiality” incorrectly favors corporate interests over public access to at least some of the data.
“What deserves protection as confidential information affecting the commercial interests of datacentre companies should be determined on a case-by-case basis,” she said.
Money & Markets Editor
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