Microsoft buys more than a billion dollars’ worth of excrement, including human poop, to clean up its AI mess — company will pump waste underground to offset AI carbon emissions

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It wants to bury poop deep underground to counter all the pollution that its data centers generate.

Vaulted Deep waste disposal
(Image credit: Vaulted Deep)

Microsoft has just signed a deal with Vaulted Deep, paying it to remove 4.9 million metric tons of waste over 12 years sourced from manure, sewage, and agricultural byproducts for injection deep underground. According to Inc., the current cost of CO2 removal with the company is $350 per ton. If you multiply that by Microsoft’s contract, that makes it worth more than $1.7 billion. However, neither entity has disclosed the actual terms of the deal, and its CEO, Julia Reichelstein, says that the company expects its costs to drop over time, and that the mentioned price isn’t the actual sum that the tech giant paid.

This isn’t the first time Redmond has paid another company to help offset its greenhouse gas emissions; Microsoft signed a deal with AtmosClear in April of this year to sequester 6.75 million metric tons of carbon dioxide. However, Vaulted’s technique is unique — instead of extracting carbon dioxide from the air or electricity production, it collects organic waste. It combines it into a thick slurry, which is then injected about 5,000 feet underground. This prevents it from being dumped at a waste disposal site, where it would eventually decompose and release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

“Generally, what happens to these wastes today is they go to a landfill, they get dumped in a waterway, or they’re just spread on land for the purpose of disposal. In all of those cases, they’re decomposing into CO2 and methane,” said Reichelstein to Inc. “That’s contributing to climate change. And then oftentimes, especially when it’s spread on land, all those pathogens are going directly into people’s groundwater.”

Projects such as these enable Microsoft and other tech giants to offset the massive amounts of carbon emissions produced by data centers, particularly as they consume a significant amount of electrical power, often generated from fossil fuels. For example, Musk is facing legal action in Memphis, Tennessee, after his company, xAI, is accused of polluting the air by using under-reported power generators at the Colossus Supercomputer. Aside from that, many companies, including Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Oracle, and others, are investing in small modular reactor research to establish their clean energy sources for their expanding data center businesses.

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Jowi Morales
Jowi Morales
Contributing Writer

Jowi Morales is a tech enthusiast with years of experience working in the industry. He’s been writing with several tech publications since 2021, where he’s been interested in tech hardware and consumer electronics.

11 Comments Comment from the forums
  • JeffreyP55
    Admin said:
    Microsoft signed a contract with Vaulted Deep to sequester 4.9 million metric tons of waste deep underground, offsetting its carbon emissions.

    Microsoft buys more than a billion dollars’ worth of excrement, including human poop — company will pump waste underground to offset AI carbon emis... : Read more
    Sounds like a bad job to me.
    Reply
  • TechieTwo
    Doesn't Microsoft generate enough crap with their operating systems? :disrelieved:
    Reply
  • BX4096
    After years of saying that Microsoft was full of s***, I feel vindicated.
    Reply
  • Alvar "Miles" Udell
    Should read "Microsoft taking tons of nutrients to grow crops and feed the world, and locking them underground."
    Reply
  • Neilbob
    I thought at first that I had misread the headline.

    I didn't misread the headline.
    Reply
  • bit_user
    Alvar Miles Udell said:
    Should read "Microsoft taking tons of nutrients to grow crops and feed the world, and locking them underground."
    That was my first thought, but I think there's probably no shortage of raw sewage for those who want to use it as fertilizer.

    It might be a good idea at least to extract key minerals like phosphorus from it, since that's a non-renewable resource. But, considering that most sewage probably ends up getting dumped into waterways, it's not like what they're doing is much worse.
    Reply
  • jg.millirem
    Offsetting is corporate PR and vastly insufficient for lowering GHGs in the atmosphere. Corporations have been playing this game for decades because it’s a lot easier than taking actually meaningful steps, such as not generating the emissions they want to emit to make $$$$$ for their shareholders. It’s replacing one harm with another. In the meantime the world slides into hell.
    Reply
  • Nolandc
    What a joke... Ai is killing the plant and the people have to pay for it .. absolute garbage...
    Reply
  • Jer Stryker
    Headline should have been, "Microsoft fires thousands of workers, uses the money to buy literal shit."

    Oh, which it's buying as a carbon offset PR stunt to offset the AI slop it's replacing said workers with.
    Reply
  • thisisaname
    Alvar Miles Udell said:
    Should read "Microsoft taking tons of nutrients to grow crops and feed the world, and locking them underground."
    Yes it is a rather poor way to lock away carbon, how much carbon does 4.9 million metric tons of waste contain?

    Approximately 44% to 55% of the dry weight of human feces is carbon. This carbon comes from undigested food, bacteria, and other organic matter in the feces.

    Here's a more detailed breakdown:
    Feces composition:Human feces is roughly 75-80% water and 20-25% solids.

    That is only at best 13.75% carbon or 0.67375 million metric tons? Could be even lower if they have to add water to turn the poop into a thick slurry!
    Reply