Larry Brilliant: "Today is a good day to choose to save the world"

The tech industry can play a major role in tackling global disease and battling climate change, according to the executive director of Google.org, Larry Brilliant.

Speaking at Salesforce.com's Dreamforce user conference in San Francisco this week, Brilliant said Google's charitable arm, Google.org, has donated around $150m in grants to charitable organisations since 2004 and allotted around $350m in online advertising space to not-for-profit organisations.

But Brilliant stressed that "ideas, flexibility and entrepreneurship" are even more important than donating money.

Google uses the same model as Salesforce.com in which one per cent of revenue, one per cent of equity and one per cent of employees' time is devoted to good causes.

Google.org also uses the company's Maps and News technology in its HealthMap system to track outbreaks of diseases and help health organisations target them before they escalate to epidemics.

Brilliant said: "The world is on a precipice of new diseases. This is an example of using emerging technology to tackle emerging diseases."

And Brilliant knows what he's talking about after playing a leading role in the successful global effort to eradicate smallpox while working for the World Health Organisation.

Brilliant also explained Google.org's efforts to tackle climate change, including the REC programme that aims to make renewable energy cheaper than coal.

He said: "Global warming is something that happens to all of us. We are in this together. It's critically important for corporations to step up."

But Brilliant admitted Google and others can only address "a handful of the world's problems" although organisations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Carter Centre and the Rockefeller Foundation have the potential to do even more.

Speaking on the day of the US presidential election Brilliant said we should be optimistic about the future. "Today is a good day to choose to save the world," he said.