Greenpeace presses Nvidia's interim chief to cut its supply chain emissions

Greenpeace is calling on Nvidia's new interim chief executive, Colette Kress, to make firm climate commitments following the resignation of cofounder Jensen Huang. The organization made the appeal in a press release on Thursday, The Verge reported. Nvidia did not immediately answer the outlet's request for comment.

Greenpeace wants the company to decarbonize by investing in renewable energy and to make sure its technology is used in ways that respect human rights. Avex Li, who leads an AI supply chain campaign at Greenpeace East Asia, said Huang had not put climate responsibility at the center of Nvidia's growth strategy or slowed the unchecked expansion of data centers. Greenpeace also says Nvidia has not met with it, even though the group has sought dialogue for two years.

The numbers behind the criticism come largely from an analysis published in September by research analyst Ketan Joshi together with several environmental groups, including Greenpeace and Climate Action Against Disinformation. Based on Nvidia's public disclosures, it found that the company's supply chain emissions have risen 725 percent since 2020. That is an increase of about 9.4 million metric tons, comparable to the yearly output of nearly 25 gas plants. Nvidia's latest sustainability report puts its fiscal 2026 supply chain emissions at around 10.7 million metric tons of CO2.

The analysts also estimated emissions from the use of the chips Nvidia sells, a category the company leaves out of its sustainability reports. Using estimates of chip power consumption, they said those emissions could have reached 21 million metric tons in 2025. Joshi said that would put Nvidia on par with Russia's state-owned coal company.

Nvidia's directly operated footprint is far smaller. Its facilities and vehicles produced 9,822 metric tons of emissions in fiscal 2026, according to the sustainability report, partly because other firms such as TSMC manufacture the chips it designs. In 2025 the company also reached its goal of matching all of its facilities' electricity use with clean energy purchases. Greenpeace wants that goal extended to the entire manufacturing supply chain.

Huang has argued that AI can help the climate. In a September episode of The Ezra Klein Show, he said leaning into AI was the best opportunity to get to a sustainable future, because power demand pushes companies to buy more clean energy. In the same interview he conceded that data centers will use more fossil fuels in the near term and that building AI infrastructure would bring an enormous amount of pain and suffering.

Nvidia also reaches into the energy sector. Its venture arm, NVentures, has backed battery recycler Redwood Materials and startups building AI tools to optimize power grids. In September, Nvidia and Google joined Emerald AI in founding the AI Energy Management Alliance, which promotes on-site power generation and flexible facilities that can pause during peak demand. Some environmental groups argue these steps may mainly help data centers connect faster without shielding households from higher utility bills or worse air quality.

Katrin Wu, a Big Tech campaigner at Greenpeace International, told The Verge that Huang may be gone, but the tech colonialism Nvidia perpetuates continues. Whether the company's footprint shrinks will depend on its next leadership, as data centers face growing opposition from nearby communities.