Google is going to trade energy - Say What? By Doug Mohney

Views and Opinions on Green IT (Mar 5 2010)

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   Not satisfied with dominating the search engine world, dabbling in wireless services, pledging to install gigabit broadband services in neighborhoods across America, threatening to pull out of China because it's been cyberattacked (and cooperating with the NSA on the side) and upsetting copyright experts over its digital library plans, Google is now going to buy and sell electricity.   Is it just me, or do you hear some "Danger, Danger Will Robinson!" in the background?

   The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has authorized Google Energy to buy and sell electricity in bulk like any other utility, reports CNet. The subsidiary of Google has been granted the rights for the sale of energy, capacity, and ancillary services at market-based rates. Apparently, large companies can get the right to trade in wholesale electricity for the purposes of managing their own energy costs.

   On the face of it, this makes sense. With data centers around the globe, electricity is one of the two key components of Google's operations, the other being network bandwidth.  Spinning up Google Energy (Goog-E) is a way for the company to get more control over its electricity pricing and get access to the "most affordable" renewable energy since Google wants to be carbon-neutral.

   Why this disturbs me is two-fold.  I'm having a symmetrical flashback to the dot.com era where Enron -- the energy trading arbitrage guys -- started trading in broadband.  Now, I'm not saying Google has the same ethical, ahem, bent as Enron, but when a company with a market cap in the hundreds of billions of dollars starts trading in power futures to influence the market to be more green, there could be some unintended and unforeseen consequences here.

   Also, this isn't Google's first dip into the energy world.  The company has invested in hundreds of millions of dollars in green energy technology research and startup companies, has its 1.6 megawatt solar installation at the corporate HQ in Silicon Valley, and has been promoting its own smart metering software for monitoring home power use from any web browser.

   If you're collecting and monitoring home energy use with one division, with data flowing in from utilities from around the world with a stated goal to reduce energy, that's one thing.  But when does self-professed altruism cross the line into self-interest if/when you are using data to save your company money? Or do you transition into it when you start making money from energy trades?

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