Give us renewable energy, there is a planet to save … and public relations to harvest • The Register

Northern Virginia is the largest data center market in the world, with over a gigawatt of colocation capacity and even more hidden servers in cloud data centers.

But the problem is very serious: almost all the small barns in the area are forced to buy their electricity from a single supplier, Dominion Energy.

US state politicians have been trying to limit the Dominion's monopoly for years, with no apparent effect. Environmentalists rallied against the company for its energy mix – of which only 5.6% came from renewable sources – but they did not go very far either. It is now the turn of some of the world's largest technology companies.

A letter signed by companies such as AWS, Apple, Akamai, Equinix, Microsoft, Iron Mountain and Salesforce demands that "energy suppliers" in Virginia – which basically means Dominion – offer more solar and wind energy to operators data centers.

The authors note that the data center sector in Virginia generates more than $ 10.2 billion in annual economic output, 43,000 jobs and $ 349 million in national and local tax revenues.

"Given the importance of our fast-growing, energy-intensive sector to total energy demand in Virginia, data centers' corporate interests should be taken into account when making decisions about energy efficiency." future energy infrastructure in the region, "says the letter.

"Dominion Energy's proposed 2018 integrated resource plan again does not fully account for the energy preferences of the data center industry – by limiting the amount of solar power purchased competitively, neglecting to consider storage of energy as a cost effective and beneficial solution. sources of energy and continue to plan the development of additional natural gas infrastructure. "

The authors call for the integration of local energy storage (LES) into the network in order to improve its stability and simplify the adoption of renewable energy sources – including the production may vary depending on weather conditions.

Of course, the companies mentioned above are concerned primarily about their public image and less of the imminent apocalypse caused by global warming, but you can not call it lip service. For example, Google is now the largest purchaser of corporate renewable energy in the United States, with more than 2.6 gigawatts of wind and solar power.

AWS has exceeded half of the use of renewable energy in 2018 and its investments in wind and solar power produce more than 2,700,000 MWh of renewable energy annually.

Microsoft's revolving portfolio totals more than 1.2 gigawatts. "This rapid growth, both in our portfolio and beyond, is due to the fact that these transactions are good for business," wrote the company spokesperson in 2018.

Apple has reached the threshold of 100% renewable, but with a caveat: Google and Apple both use special energy purchase agreements, market tools created to finance energy production renewable even when there is no solar or wind capacity in the immediate vicinity.

"A clean, flexible and dynamic network, filled with renewable energy and modern energy technologies, is the way of the future. It is essential that today's energy investments are forward-looking and truly serve the best interests of taxpayers, the economy and the planet for future generations, "the letter concludes. ®