2011-04-23

Google's Renewable Energy Initiatives

Google Energy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Google Energy LLC is a subsidiary company of Google, which was created to reduce costs of energy consumption of the Google Group, amounting to 2.5 million dollars[1], and subsequently to produce and sell clean energy. The division also allows it to take advantage of projects funded through the philanthropic Google.org.


YouTube - Going Green at Google

Find out how Google is going green by improving operations, building tools that empower users, and investing in a clean energy future. Learn more at http://google.com/green



Official Google Blog: Investing in the world’s largest solar power tower plant

We’ve invested $168 million in an exciting new solar energy power plant being developed by BrightSource Energy in the Mojave Desert in California. Brightsource’s Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System (ISEGS) will generate 392 gross MW of clean, solar energy. That’s the equivalent of taking more than 90,000 cars off the road over the lifetime of the plant, projected to be more than 25 years. The investment makes business sense and will help ensure that one of the world’s largest solar energy projects is completed.

Brightsource Energy’s Solar Energy Development Center in Israel’s Negev desert



Renewable Energy for Data Centers

We are purchasing clean, renewable wind energy sufficient to power several of our large data centers in a continuing effort to green our operations. To date we have completed two agreements, both from NextEra Energy Resources. The first was for 114 megawatts of wind generation from the Story County II facility in Iowa, and the second for 100.8 megawatts of wind generation from the Minco II facility in Oklahoma. (See our announcements for Iowa and Oklahoma) We made these agreements through Google Energy LLC, an entity formed in December, 2009 that allows us to procure large volumes of renewable energy by participating in the wholesale market.
Collected from: Google Green


The wind farm, which began operation in December 2009, consists of 100 GE 1.5MW XLE turbines




Investing in a clean energy future

[...]
  • North Dakota wind farms. In May, we invested $38.8 million in two North Dakota wind farms that generate 169.5MW, enough to power 55,000 homes. It was our first project investment, and uses some of the latest wind turbine technology and control systems to provide one of the lowest-cost sources of renewable energy to the local grid.
  • Offshore wind transmission. In October, we made a development stage investment in a project to build a backbone transmission line off the Mid-Atlantic coast. The project will put in place strong, secure transmission, removing a major barrier to scaling up offshore wind. When finished, the 350-mile line will connect up to 6,000MW of offshore wind energy—enough to serve approximately 1.9 million households!



A clear windy day at the Ashtabula II wind farm





Google.org invests more than $10 million in breakthrough geothermal energy technology


Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) could supply thousands of times US energy needs


Mountain View, California (August 19, 2008) – In the continuing effort to develop electricity from renewable energy cheaper than from coal, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), through its philanthropic arm Google.org, announced $10.25 million in investments in a breakthrough energy technology called Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS). Today's announcement also includes funding for research on next-generation geothermal resource mapping, EGS information tools, and a policy agenda for geothermal energy.



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