Category: Fossil Fuel

Facebook and Greenpeace have buried the hatchet and agreed to work together on the Open Compute Project, an open source initiative to share energy-efficient data centre designs across the IT industry. The two companies have not seen eye to eye since Greenpeace started a campaign against Facebook’s use of coal-sourced energy by launching a Facebook page entitled “Unfriend Coal”. The new Like situation has come with undertakings on both parts. Greenpeace is putting its weight firmly behind the Open Compute Project by encouraging other companies to join in with the sharing and adoption of the energy-efficient technology. As part of this, it will also help to raise awareness of the “social energy” application designed by Opower, Facebook and environmental advocacy group the Natural Resources Defence Council (NRDC). The Opower-developed application allows people to see how their energy use compares to the national average and to other participants in the ...

As 2011 wrapped up, the year’s steady stream of data center news continued, with highlights including Facebook and Greenpeace reaching an “cease-fire” over coal-fired power plants, Norway’s fjord-cooled data center, and Emerson’s projection of the total number of data centers worldwide. Also popular were our year-end coverage of the best stories of the year, trends of the year, and predictions for 2011. Here’s a look at the 10 most popular stories of December 2011, ranked by total page views:

A nice little report out telling us that going green isn't in fact going to cost us anything. Which is indeed nice as just about everyone else would just love to clean up the planet, reduce pollution and not boil Gaia but we have this sneaking suspicion that the costs of doing so are going to be greater than the benefits. So to hear that it won't cost anything is just glorious: miraculous in fact.

Bill Weihl, who was the “Green Energy Czar” at Google, will begin a similar position at Facebook next month. Weihl’s hiring comes as Facebook is deepending its commitment to use renewable energy as part of an agreement with Greenpeace. Weihl’s move was first reported by Greenmonk, and has been confirmed by Facebook. Weihl left Google in November after six years at Google, during which he championed the company’s efforts to boost its use of renewable energy in its data centers. That included Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) to add more wind power to utility grids that support Google data centers in Council Bluffs, Iowa and Pryor, Oklahoma. Google says it expects these two agreements alone to account for 15 percent of its company-wide energy usage by the end of 2012, pushing its overall renewable mix to 35 percent.

Facebook said yesterday that its data center site location policy “now states a preference for access to clean and renewable energy.” The announcement ended a long-running feud between the social network and the environmental group Greenpeace, which had targeted Facebook in a social media and PR campaign because the company’s two data centers in Oregon and North Carolina each relied upon utility power that originated primarily from coal. Is Facebook’s announcement an isolated incident in which a company alters its policies in response to outside pressure? Or is it a sign that renewable energy will become a larger factor on site location decisions, boosting regions with “green” power in their utility mix?

Facebook on Thursday announced that it will work with environmental group Greenpeace to encourage major utilities to develop renewable energy generation while creating programs to help its users to save energy and engage their communities in clean energy decisions.

December 15, 2011 -- Non-profit environmental organization Greenpeace and social network Facebook announced on Thursday that they will collaborate on the promotion of renewable energy, and develop programs that will enable Facebook users to save energy and engage their communities.

After two years of sparring over data center energy, Greenpeace and Facebook today announced a truce, with Facebook agreeing to prioritize the use of renewable energy for its data centers, and Greenpeace suspending its "Unfriend Dirty Coal" campaign.

Last week’s story that Apple may be planning a data centre in Oregon, near Facebook’s controversial location, may turn out to be a rumour, or may be reality. Either way, it was a timely reminder that consumerisation and the cloud are changing the way tech companies are judged on environmental issues. Apple has had a poor rating from environmental campaigners in recent years, largely because of a lack of transparency about the environmental impact of its consumer products. This has been changing somewhat as it opens up slightly, and Apple sits somewhere in the middle of Greenpeace’s latest consumer IT rankings A cloud hanging over all green IT? However the arrival of the cloud changes things. When Apple first launched its iPad, Greenpeace was quick to respond that more client devices with higher expectations of data and connectivity, use more energy and create more emissions. It is ...

Solar power has been only capable of producing a small part of data centre energy needs, but this may change, says Peter Judge Solar power has always seemed a good long term bet for renewable energy. After all, pretty much every single Joule of energy we use on the planet comes from the sun originally The sun’s energy is caught by plants, which make fuels, either through the long process of fossilisation producing oil and gas, or by directly producing wood, or man-made ethanol to burn. Animals’ energy comes from plants, and the sun drives the water cycle which produces hydro-electric energy. Nuclear power uses energy stored from older suns where the heavier elements are made. Geothermal energy does include energy originating on earth – it is the heat of the earth’s core, but it is maintained at that temperature by radioactive decay inside the earth.

Apple is considering a data centre in Prineville Oregon, near to Facebook, a move sure to anger Greenpeace Apple is reportedly considering following in the footsteps of Facebook by building a mammoth data centre in Prineville, Oregon. However if the reports are true, the move will surely incur the wrath of environmental campaigners Greenpeace. According to OregonLive.com, which cited two people with direct knowledge of Apple’s plans, Apple is close to making a decision about whether to build a large data centre in Prineville, which will be located a quarter mile south of the Facebook server farm that opened in 2011.

Global carbon dioxide emissions from industry rose about 3 percent in a weak global economy this year, a study released today showed, adding fresh urgency to efforts to control planet-warming gases at U.N. climate talks in South Africa. The study by the Global Carbon Project, an annual report card on mankind's CO2 pollution, says a slowdown in emissions during the 2008-09 global financial crisis was a mere speed bump, and the gain in 2011 followed a 6 percent surge in 2010. "The global financial crisis was an opportunity to move the global economy away from a high-emissions trajectory. Our results provide no indication of this happening," the authors say in the study published in the journal Nature Climate Change.

Google is abandoning efforts to make renewable energy cheaper than coal, the company blogged yesterday. The internet giant said is cancelling seven projects, including the aptly named Renewable Energy Cheaper than Coal (RE

Facebook says its Prineville, Oregon data center received Gold-level LEED green building certification on the back of an elaborate evaporative cooling system that taps outdoor air for heating and cooling.

While the failure of government-backed solar start-up Solyndra generated a lot of news headlines, it has also encouraged some discussion about the role of government in helping get new industries off the ground. It may also have highlighted the fact that venture capital companies and their investors may be starting to fall out of love with alternative energy, an industry that has proven it needs a long runway for take-off. Venture capitalists and investors, not always the most patient of people, seem to be increasingly wary about investing in technologies that are still in their infancy, or at least in their youth. But as the news last week brought us the knowledge that the seven billionth human being entered the world somewhere in India, the need to move forward with alternative energy remains urgent. And move forward it will: though it may not find itself using government cash or traditional ...