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Google Data Center Gets Greener With New Wind Agreement

Google announced today that it has reached an agreement with the Grand River Dam Authority (GRDA) to green the energy supply to its Oklahoma data center. This includes 48 MW of wind energy from the Ca...
Google Data Center Gets Greener With New Wind Agreement
Written by Chris Crum
  • Google announced today that it has reached an agreement with the Grand River Dam Authority (GRDA) to green the energy supply to its Oklahoma data center. This includes 48 MW of wind energy from the Canadian Hills Wind Project in Oklahoma, which Google says will come online later this year.

    “We’ve been working with GRDA, our local utility, to procure additional renewable energy since we ‘plugged in’ our data center in 2011, and in February of 2012, GRDA approached us about purchasing power from Canadian Hills,” explains Gary Demasi, director of Google’s Global Infrastructure team. “In conjunction with the electricity GRDA already supplies Google to operate its data center, Google will pay GRDA a premium to purchase renewable energy generated by Canadian Hills. This brings the total amount of renewable energy for which Google has contracted to over 260 MW.”

    “This agreement is a milestone for GRDA because it’s their first-ever wind energy project,” adds Demasi. “It’s also a milestone for Google because it’s a little different from the previous Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) we’ve signed, where we agreed to buy the energy directly from the developer who built the wind farm. This agreement, by contrast, marks the first time we’ve partnered with a utility provider to increase the amount of renewable energy powering one of our data centers.”

    Google’s Oklahoma data center happens to be the same one where it has a one-eyed security dog.

    Earlier this year, Google outlined some other ways its data centers are getting more energy efficient. More on that here.

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