Apple to power its cloud with the sun

Apple has announced that it plans to power its main US data center, used for its iCloud services, entirely from solar energy by the end of the year.

The maker of the iPod, iPhone and iPad will now install the help of SunPower Corp and Bloom Energy in the build of two new solar array installations at the billion-dollar site in Maiden, North Carolina.

The solar farm, which will cover 250 acres, will supply the facility with 84 million kWh of energy per year when completed.

“I'm not aware of any other company producing energy onsite at this scale,” Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer told Reuters.

Last month, a report published by environmental campaigners Greenpeace labeled Apple as the “dirtiest” in the technology industry and condemned the company’s reliance on coal-fired power stations at its respective data centers.

“Apple right now is falling behind companies like Google and Facebook, who are taking a leadership role on this issue,” Greenpeace spokesman Dave Pomerantz said at the time.

The two Maiden sites will utilize high-efficiency solar cells and will incorporate an advanced solar tracking system. Apple said that a third site for the generation of renewable energy in the form of a biogas fuel cell plant will also be built in Maiden, enabling the facility to be coal-free by the end of 2012.

“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.”

“Our next facility will be in Prineville, Oregon. This is still in the planning stages and we have already identified plenty of renewable sources nearby,” added Oppenheimer.

“We haven't finalized 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.”

 

Image 01: Andrew* | Flickr

Images 02 & 03: Climate Action Stock Photos