Cheeseburger powers 15,000 Google searches

Google published the revelation in a blog entry on its company blog which examined how Google searches have a environmental impact and that each time someone conducts a search query.

Google determined that each time a search is conducted 0.2 grams of carbon is emitted and nearly 1 kilojoule of energy is utilized. The company compiled a chart which sheds light, and a deeper understanding of these numbers:



Google compiled the data in their chart in an attempt to make light of reports that the company’s data centers a responsible for excessive energy consumption. The Sunday Times estimated that 7g of carbon dioxide was emitted each time a search was conducted, which is far greater than the company’s actual findings.

Google counters the argument of their high consumption by pointing out that the energy consumed to put a cheeseburger in a Happy Meal actually uses as much carbon dioxide as 15,000 searches on Google. Additionally, creating the average daily newspaper would equate to 850 Google searches, and washing a load of dishes in your dishwasher would be equivalent to 5,100 searches using the engine.

Each day over 200 million searches make their way through the website, which would mean that the company’s data centers are unleashing a whopping 45 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere daily, which is 13,000 cheeseburgers or the equivalent of a gas-powered vehicle traveling 100,000 miles.

Google still touts being a leader in energy efficiency. Through efficiency innovations, we have managed to cut energy usage in our data centres by over 50%, so we're using less than half the energy to run our data centres as the industry average," Urs Holzle, senior vice president of operations, claims.

"This efficiency means that in the time it takes to do a Google search, your own personal computer will likely use more energy than we will use to answer your query."

But getting back to that cheeseburger...