Apple has said it plans to build two solar array installations close to its North Carolina iCloud data centre, one more than it had previously planned.
According to Reuters, the farms will supply 84 million kWh of energy annually. In its 2012 Facilities Report, Apple said it planned to build one solar installation to supply 42 million kWh annually. Alongside the solar array, Apple said it would also build a biogas fuel cell installation. ‘This 5-megawatt facility, located directly adjacent to the data center, will be powered by 100 percent biogas, and provide more than 40 million kWh of 24×7 baseload renewable energy annually,’ explained the report.
‘I’m not aware of any other company producing energy onsite at this scale,’ Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer told Reuters. ‘The plan we are releasing today includes two solar farms and together they will be twice as big as we previously announced, thanks to the purchase of some land very near to the data center in Maiden, which will help us meet this goal.’
Oppenheimer also said that Apple’s next data centre, in Prineville, Oregon would be 100% powered from renewable sources. ‘We haven’t finalised our plans for on-site generation, but any power we need to run our center in Prineville that we get from the grid will be 100 percent renewable and locally generated sources,’ he said.
Greenpeace which criticised Apple earlier this year for its reliance on coal-fired power stations run by North Carolina utility, Duke Energy, welcomed the move. ‘Apple’s announcement today is a great sign that Apple is taking seriously the hundreds of thousands of its customers who have asked for an iCloud powered by clean energy, not dirty coal,’ Greenpeace International Senior IT Analyst Gary Cook said in a statement.
Data centre image courtesy of Big Stock Photo.
