What you need to know
- Microsoft employees released a letter protesting Microsoft's role in climate change.
- Microsoft recently announced a partnership with Schlumberger and Chevron.
- The Global Climate Strike starts on September 20, 2019.
Microsoft workers released a letter protesting Microsoft's role in climate change (via The Verge). The letter was posted on Github, and states that "it's no longer possible for us to ignore Microsoft's complicity in the climate crisis." The letter was posted days before the Global Climate Strike. As pointed out by The Verge, several employees from Microsoft, Amazon, and Google plan to participate in the strike.
The letter from Microsoft employees was released just days after Microsoft announced partnerships with Chevron and Schlumberger. The letter from Microsoft employees discusses those contracts as well as Microsoft's partnership with Equinor last year.
In this week's company-wide all-hands, our CEO, Satya Nadella, defended our contracts with Big Oil by suggesting that our technology helps them in their R&D efforts to develop sustainable energy. Yet, this is in clear contradiction to the ambitions of fossil fuel-CEOs and even other Microsoft leaders.
The letter calls for action and states that tech companies have the technology and resources required to affect climate change.
If we want to make real impact, all of us need to mobilize, work together, and demand a fundamental change in Microsoft's priorities. It's clear that the tech industry is one of the main culprits behind our burning planet, both in consuming a great deal of fossil fuels through power hungry datacenters and supporting Big Oil companies. But we also have to recognize that we're equipped with so many resources that we can leverage to steer our industry and government in the right direction.
Microsoft has not released an official response at the time of publication.
