Greenpeace International gave Apple a mixed review over its clean energy plans for its data centers, the huge servers farms that power its iCloud and other online services like iTunes, saying in a report today that the company hasn’t provided enough details about how it’s going to reach its goals.
In an update to a controversial report, environmental activist group Greenpeace partly applauded Apple for taking more steps to add clean power to its data center, yet also said Apple should both be more transparent about its plans and should also be doing more.
Those Bloom Energy fuel cells that eBay said it will use to power its new data center in Utah? They’ll run on natural gas. Likewise most Bloom Boxes going in these days. But they can run on biogas -- and eBay, like many of the companies turning to fuel cells these days, is paying a premium for its natural gas in order to enable biogas production. This is part of the story of the rise in demand for biogas, a trend highlighted by Pike Research in a new report. The market analysts said biogas, while still “a relatively minor player within the overall bioenergy sector,” reached $17.3 billion in revenue in 2011 and is on course to nearly double that figure by 2022.
Over the past several years, a couple-hundred-mile area north of Charlotte, North Carolina, has emerged as a new hub for massive data centers that power the Internet, attracting industry heavyweights like Apple, Google and Facebook. North Carolina has been able win over those companies despite the fact it generates its power largely from dirty coal and nuclear, which runs counter to a general trend toward a desire for greener sources of energy.
We interviewed executives at some of the biggest Internet companies, as well as hardware vendors, economic development groups, and utilities to find out why North Carolina has emerged as a hub for Internet leaders mega data centers. Here are the 10 biggest reasons:
Looking for an exciting geek adventure this summer? You may want to follow in the footsteps of GigaOM's Katie Fehrenbacher, who recently took a one-day road trip to visit the sites of some of the world's largest data centers. These facilities, all of which are located in a small area of North Carolina, include Apple's new Maiden data center as well as facilities belonging to Google and Facebook.
Those Bloom Energy fuel cells that eBay said it will use to power its new data center in Utah? They'll run on natural gas. Likewise most Bloom Boxes going in these days. But they can run on biogas – and eBay, like many of the companies turning to fuel cells these days, is paying a premium for its natural gas in order to enable biogas production.
Those Bloom Energy fuel cells that eBay said it will use to power its new data center in Utah? They’ll run on natural gas. Likewise most Bloom Boxes going in these days. But they can run on biogas – and eBay, like many of the companies turning to fuel cells these days, is paying a premium for its natural gas in order to enable biogas production.
EBay will be the first major tech company to use alternative power as a primary source to handle its data centres instead of the national power grid, which runs on coal plants—though the new centres will still connect to the electricity grid for backup. EBay plans to use about six million watts of power generated on-site by fuel cells, which are a cleaner and more efficient source of energy than coal, at its new data centre in South Jordan, Utah. The company also operates PayPal, the online payment service, out of the South Jordan site.
Massive thunderstorms knocked out Amazon’s web services on Friday night and the cloud giant was still struggling to get service back up on Saturday, affecting major AWS customers like Netflix, Instagram and Pinterest. To me the news raises the question: is it time for the huge data center operators to more seriously investigate off-grid options? It’s not as crazy as it sounds, and some Internet players already are experimenting with generating their own power onsite for parts of their data centers and using the grid partly as back up power. Last week eBay announced that for an extension of its data center in Utah, it plans to power that new capacity with 30 fuel cells from Bloom Energy, making that section of the data center grid independent.
Alternative energy is beginning to force its way into the limelight as concerns regarding the climate and energy prices grow. Stationary fuel cells are quickly becoming a popular option for companies looking to become more environmentally friendly, or those simply looking to comply with new standards established in their country of operation. These fuel cells have found their way to data centers around the world. For years, stationary fuel cells had been used as a backup power option, but are not being used as a primary source of energy for large-scale
The company that changed the nature of online shopping is now at work in Utah on a plan that could change the way large data processing facilities consume energy. EBay recently announced it will undertake a massive expansion of its data center in South Jordan, and the new facility will operate entirely on renewable energy. The reaction in technology and energy sectors has been nothing short of electric.
The NSW pricing regulator IPART has raised what it considers to be the “fair value” of solar electricity exported from rooftop installations back into the grid, but has fallen sort of industry claims it should be on a 1:1 basis. IPART says its new range for 2012/13 is 7.7c-12.9c/kWh. This is higher than the 5.2c-10.3c/kWh range for 2011/12, mostly because of the introduction of the carbon price and its impact on wholesale prices. The fair value range is merely a guide for consumers, and energy retailers are not required to pay that sum. Most offer around 6c/kWh as a voluntary payment. Some offer nothing, although all will be required to publish their offerings on a web set so that customers can shop around.
Apple is producing enough clean power, through solar panels and fuel cells, at its data center in North Carolina that it says it can cover 60 percent of the total energy needs of the data center. Will the tech giant be doing the same thing at its new planned $1 billion data center just outside of Reno, Nevada? While details are few at this point, it sure looks like Apple is looking to have a significant amount of its data center power needs met with clean, and grid-independent, power.
It hasn't been easy for Bloom Energy, since the April 30th groundbreaking at the University of Delaware STAR (Science, Technology and Advanced Research) campus at the former site of the Chrysler Newark Assembly Plant. The event attracted a virtual who's who of business and government leaders who lavished praise on Bloom and efforts by the administration of Gov. Jack Markell in bringing the company to Delaware.
Global concerns about climate change, dependence on oil imports and increasing oil prices have brought renewable energy onto the centre stage of various data centers across the world. Taking this into consideration, online giant eBay has planned to power its main data centre in Utah primarily with renewable energy.
A federal lawsuit has just been filed in Delaware against fuel cell maker Bloom Energy, alleging that the company benefited from cronyism and special treatment by the state government. In fact, an analysis of Bloom Energy's own past admissions reveals that "cronyism" may be the least of the company's problems: the "green" energy its generators produce may, in fact, be less efficient, more expensive, and dirtier than that produced by conventional alternatives.
Using fuel cells from Bloom Energy, the 6MW installation will provide the primary energy source for the data centre, with the electricity grid providing back up power. According to eBay, the data centre will be the US’ largest non-utility fuel cell project. The fuel cells themselves will be powered by biogas derived from renewable organic waste. John Donahoe, chief executive of eBay, said: “We are embracing disruptive energy technology and designing it into our core data centre energy architecture. Running our data centres primarily on reliable, renewable energy, we intend to shape a future for commerce that is more environmentally sustainable at its core.”
For your weekend reading, here’s a recap of five noteworthy stories that appeared on Data Center Knowledge this past week. Enjoy! Top 10 Supercomputers, Illustrated (June 2012) – The twice-a-year list of the Top 500 supercomputers documents the most powerful systems on the planet. Many of these supercomputers are striking not just for their processing power, but for their design and appearance as well. Here’s a look at the top finishers in the latest Top 500 list, which was released Monday.