Google has confirmed it will hit its target of offsetting 100% of the energy used at its data centres and offices against power from renewable sources.<\/p>\n
The firm first made the commitment in 2015 to go 100% renewable by 2017.<\/p>\n
In a blog, the company said it was now the largest corporate buyer of renewable energy in the world.<\/p>\n
Fossil fuels are still used by Google, but now it buys enough electricity from renewable sources to offset energy use at the data centres and offices.<\/p>\n
Its 13 data centres alone consume around 5.7 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity.<\/p>\n
“Over the last six years, the cost of wind and solar came down 60% and 80% respectively, proving that renewables are increasingly becoming the lowest cost option,” said Urs Holzle, senior vice president for technical infrastructure.<\/p>\n
He added: “Since the wind doesn’t blow 24 hours a day, we’ll also broaden our purchases to a variety of energy sources that can enable renewable power, every hour of every day.”<\/p>\n
Analysis – Dave Lee, BBC North America technology reporter, San Francisco<\/strong><\/p>\n Of course the big incentive for a company like Google to hit this kind of target is the bounty of tax incentives offered by the US government (and others) for investing in clean energy.<\/p>\n But with incoming President Donald Trump seemingly dismissive of climate change – even calling it a “hoax” in a tweet – those rewards may be coming to an abrupt end.<\/p>\n Ahead of today’s news, I spoke to Gary Demasi, the man in charge of Google’s strategy for energy. He said the company isn’t worried.<\/p>\n “Incentives have been a valuable way, historically, of getting these projects built,” he told me.<\/p>\n “The tax incentives still make a difference and they’re still important. They are scheduled to decline over the next few years. We have been on record acknowledging that we’re not concerned about that reduction – largely because the costs of the technology are coming down anyway.”<\/p>\n ‘Good for the planet’<\/strong><\/p>\n The move by Google has been welcomed by Friends of the Earth (FoE).<\/p>\n “Google has come up with the right answer: investing in renewable power is good for business and good for the planet,” said FoE energy campaigner Alasdair Cameron.<\/p>\n He added that he believed companies, cities and even entire countries will switch to 100% renewable sources of energy.<\/p>\n In 2010, Germany’s environment agency noted that the country could be 100% powered by renewable energy sources by 2050, for example.<\/p>\n Google’s news comes at a time when the US President-elect Donald Trump is under pressure from US companies not to abandon the Paris climate deal.<\/p>\n Mr Cameron is also calling on the UK government to follow in the footsteps of Google and to continue to invest in renewable energy sources.<\/p>\n –<\/p>\n Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Google has confirmed it will hit its target of offsetting 100% of the energy used at its data centres and offices against power from renewable sources. The firm first made the commitment in 2015 to go 100% renewable by 2017. In a blog, the company said it was now the largest corporate buyer of renewable […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":275010,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[106],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n
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