Google buys into wind - what next? by doug mohney

Views and Opinions on Green IT (May 7 2010) Wind

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   This week, Google (www.google.com) announced it put $38.8 million into two North Dakota wind firms. It's the company's first direct investment into large scale renewable energy -- and likely not to be the last.

   From a "green" perspective, Google's investment rings most of the good bells.  There's already existing transmission capability to deliver the 169.5 megawatts of power from the NextEra Energy Resources plants. It's a minority investment for the company, it is expected to make a profit (well, tax offsets, so reduction of expense) and it has lots of good shiny-shiny press for both The Goog and for wind energy.

   In Google's blog posting announcing the wind-energy investment, effective policy, innovative technology and smart capital are highlighted as the three things needed to reach a clean energy future.  Google is already working the lobbying machine through philanthropic arm Google.org for better policies.  It has also invested venture investments into early-stage renewable energy companies like concentrated solar company eSolar and geothermal company AltaRock.

   But the post also hints at "investments" -- plural -- to both accelerate deployment of clean energy tech and provide "attractive returns" to Google.  It’s unclear how much they will put into renewable energy, but they have the cash and they aren't afraid to use it.

   Unfortunately, the blog cruises by the fact that Google also is collecting and analyzing energy usage data for "free" if you're nice enough to buy the monitor from them. Google has also filed to buy and sell energy on the wholesale market, which puts them into a very interesting position when it comes to energy since it will be 1) Gathering data in near-real time on energy usage around the globe 2) Generating green power and 3) Selling it as a wholesaler.

   Let's be very clear here -- while Google is being all smiles and happiness about saving the world from the evils of carbon, it is steadily building a portfolio to make money from green energy.  Expect more investments of the collecting-green-dollars kind in the future. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it would be nice to see Google taking a more DARPA-esque high-risk/high-reward approach to some future ventures rather than just betting on sure things. 

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