Pitch Dreck While projecting an image of sustainability, Microsoft has secretly been selling bespoke AI services to fossil fuel giants and claiming it can help them make even more money while killing the climate. As The Atlantic’s Karen Hao reports, whistleblowers say that the tech giant has been pitching all manner of wild promises to oil companies like ExxonMobil and Chevron — and working to hide that fact from the public. After reviewing troves of documents and speaking to dozens of former and current Microsoft employees, Hao found that Microsoft is providing oil companies with AI algorithms designed to help them “maximize” their potential by predicting where best to drill. In a 2022 pitch deck the reporter acquired, for instance, Microsoft claimed that its AI tools could help ExxonMobil increase its annual revenue by $1.4 billion. Of that figure, $600 million of that slated revenue would come from so-called “sustainable production,” which purportedly allows for fossil fuel drilling that uses less energy. While making these lofty pitches, the AI-bullish tech monstrosity also ambitiously pledged since 2020 to become “carbon negative” by the year 2030, and has since championed its AI as being a driving force for sustainability. Announcements of Microsoft’s partnerships with oil and gas companies since have left out that the tech giant is helping some of these polluters streamline their drilling processes. Neg Off Microsoft repeatedly insisted that its goal of corporate carbon negativity is not at odds with the work its oil and gas clients do because its…Microsoft Secretly Selling AI to Fossil Fuel Companies While Bragging About Environmental Progress