Public appeal · Climate responsibility
Data centre build-out and industrial infrastructure
Documentation · Power and emissions

OPEN LETTER: To the leadership of Microsoft Norway on data centre build-out and climate responsibility.

To:

Kristine Dahl Steidel, General Manager/CEO at Microsoft Norway

Sven Nicolaysen, COO Microsoft Norway

Vibeke Hansen, Communications Director

I am writing this letter to you as a direct follow-up to the open letter sent to Microsoft's global top management – CEO Satya Nadella, Vice Chair Brad Smith and CSO Melanie Nakagawa.

The international letter was written in June while we were waiting for Microsoft to publish this year's sustainability report. In the period 2020–2025, Microsoft's sustainability reports mostly came out in May. So why was this year's report delayed?
Now we know why. As far as we know, the report came out in August, and it appears you had used the time to disguise a dramatic change of course. Officially you talk about climate targets, while at the same time entering into a 20-year agreement with Chevron on gas-fired power plants to run your AI investment.
The plants could produce between 11.5 and 13 million tonnes of CO2 a year, in addition to 3,200 tonnes of harmful air pollution.

By comparison, Norway as a whole produces 44.1 million tonnes of CO2 equivalents a year

The madness continues in Vineland, New Jersey. Here, DataOne has contracted to supply power to your AI data centre. This has sparked protests and serious concerns about the environment and public health. Investigations and thermal drone footage reveal that the facility runs dozens of illegal gas-fired generators to meet an insane demand for electricity. Of 62 gas turbines deployed, at least 45 were found in operation without the required environmental permits.

The gas turbines are located about one kilometre from two local schools and emit significant amounts of air pollution, including CO2 and dangerous nitrogen oxides. Local residents are protesting against the noise, light and air pollution.

At the end of the summer, this year's sustainability report finally arrived, and it shows alarming figures, even though much was left out.

  • Microsoft's new report does not mention the fossil gas plants. The fossil-fuelled power plants will more than double its emissions.
  • Microsoft's actual emissions have increased by 80% since 2020, mainly due to infrastructure for new data centres.
  • Microsoft's electricity consumption has increased by almost 250% since 2020, and the company now uses as much electricity as Denmark. Between 2024 and 2025, Microsoft increased its electricity consumption by 7 terawatt hours, equivalent to the entire consumption of Latvia.

How will you manage to be energy, carbon and water neutral by 2030?

For many years Microsoft set the standard for ambitious environmental targets, with promises to become carbon negative, water positive and powered by 100% emission-free energy by 2030. When you enter into an agreement with Chevron, that is a drastic shift away from these goals.

1. The environmental consequences and facilitation of fossil fuels

In North America, communities bordering your data centres face higher electricity bills, more noise and pollution, and pressure on local water supplies. Instead of delivering sustainable energy, your facilities are increasingly powered by fossil generation to meet the enormous energy demands of artificial intelligence (AI) and other cloud services.

2. Paying tax – and opaque global operations

Microsoft's financial contribution to the countries and regions that provide electricity, water and land appears to disappear into global corporate structures.

In Norway, Microsoft has had four data centres since 2018 and is actively seeking to establish new ones. But despite revenue of NOK 3.5 billion in 2025, Microsoft Datacenter Norway AS had only 51 employees and paid just NOK 85 million in tax to Norway – about 2.4% of revenue. By defining these centres as purely internal operations with Microsoft Ireland as the company's only customer, the company extracts local energy, land and infrastructure, while the financial value is moved out of the country. Why should Norway give you more land and power when we get little or nothing back?

Norwegian politicians should think about that too!

3. A call to commit to real leadership

When you publish your next sustainability report, we urge you not to abandon your climate pledges in the pursuit of uncontrolled data centre growth. We ask Microsoft to:

  • Recommit to 24/7 clean energy: Stop using fossil power for new and existing data centres, and invest in new sustainable, stable and secure energy. Stop using diesel generators for backup.
  • Ensure transparency: Publish energy consumption, carbon emissions and water use in real time for every data centre you operate globally. Stop using NDAs that keep authorities and local residents from information about the real consumption of resources.
  • Align AI sales with climate science: End cloud and AI partnerships that directly support or accelerate the exploration and extraction of fossil fuels.
  • Ensure a fair partnership with local communities: Move away from aggressive tax optimisation models in host countries such as Norway, so that the communities that provide land, power and infrastructure get jobs and value back.
  • Microsoft was once a pioneer of environmental responsibility in the technology industry. If you sacrifice this commitment in favour of irresponsible growth and questionable financial models, it could have consequences for you and the entire tech industry.

You can see the original letter here:https://microsoftlies.com

I have signed it, and I encourage others to do the same.

Ørjan Stenseng

Founder and CEO, speaker, author

Further reading and sources