Microsoft vies for scarce clean power in Asia chipmaking nations

Microsoft warned that it is competing for limited supplies of clean electricity in parts of East Asia, even as its window to achieve a key 2030 climate target narrows.

In Taiwan, South Korea and Japan, the company is vying “for a very small pie of available renewable power today,” Ken Haig, Microsoft’s senior director of government affairs in Japan, said during a panel discussion at the Innovation for Cool Earth Forum in Tokyo on Thursday (Oct 9).

The company’s challenges mirror those of its chief chip suppliers that are also based in East Asia, which rely on grids that remain heavily dependent on fossil fuels and struggle to rapidly expand renewables.

Emissions generated from the production of semiconductors that underpin artificial intelligence services grew more than fourfold in 2024, according to Greenpeace.

Global companies – especially big tech firms – have been trying to secure clean-power sources to decarbonize their operations as the race for artificial intelligence lifts electricity demand. But some are seeing their emissions rise.

Microsoft’s total planet-warming impact is 23 per cent higher than it was in 2020, in part because of its vast expansion of emissions-intensive data centres, according to its 2025 sustainability report. Microsoft has a target to be carbon negative by 2030.

The company’s biggest emissions challenge is curbing its Scope three emissions, which constitutes more than 97 per cent of its overall carbon footprint.

A significant portion of that comes from semiconductor manufacturing in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan, according to Haig.

“We need our suppliers also to be getting onto 100 per cent carbon-free energy” said Haig. Microsoft is collaborating with suppliers through coalitions of energy consumers that advocate for increased renewable energy options in Asia. BLOOMBERG