Google Increases Green Energy Investments

Google, Inc. is known for stretching it technological arm across the globe. Whenever we log on to the internet we think of Google’s presence. The word Google has officially become a verb. We use Google’s products to search for information and we show our appreciation for the quirky products like driverless cars and Google Glass. Google isn’t interested in just creating cool widgets and gadgets for consumers, it is also interested in sustainable energy.

The corporation has invested more than $1 billion dollars into renewable energy in recent years. It has agreed to buy electricity from a Swedish wind farm for the next ten years and recently invested in a South African solar-power project. This is the first renewable energy deal that Google has closed on the African continent. The search engine giant is investing $12 million dollars into the project.

Google’s renewable energy projects in Africa will focus on clean, geothermal energy. The current investment will go toward a 96 megawatt solar photovoltaic plant developed in the Northern Cape. Google credits supportive policies for clean renewable energy in Africa as the reason for the investment.

Over the years, Google has invested a lot in low-carbon power. It has invested in a wind farm in West Texas, wind power in Iowa, photovoltaic projects in California, wind energy in Mojave, photovoltaics in Germany, and has invested in large projects and funds for solar energy rooftops throughout the U.S.

The recent deal for the Swedish wind farm is with O2, a Nordic wind farm developer. Google will buy all the power generated by the wind farm for 10 years. The power will come from a 24-turbine wind farm that will start operating in 2015.

Urs Hölzle, senior vice-president of technical infrastructure at Google, said of the deal, “This long-term agreement, our fourth globally, means we can power our Finnish data centre with clean energy –and add new wind-generation capacity to the European grid.”

 

 

 

Linda St.Cyr is a writer, blogger, activist, and short story author. She writes about news, sustainability, green energy, food, celebrities and much more. Often she is busy being vocal about feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, and shedding a light on human rights violations all over the world.

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