Amazon
has decided that it’s not enough to beat Apple in the 7" Tablet Category
with the Amazon Kindle Fire and all her children as listed in my blog article
entitled “Kindle
Fire battle Apple iPad Mini in 2014 - Why @Amazon Tablet Glory Days fading as
Tablet Extinction inevitable”.
They've
now decided to make their mark in the area of Renewable Energy by building a
US$150 million dollar Solar Farm in Virginia in the US of A called Amazon Solar
Farm US East as reported in the article “Amazon
backs $150 million solar project in Virginia”, published June 10, 2015 by
Ben Fox Rubin, CNET News.
The
details on this latest project, revealed in an Amazon
Press Release, marks a rare move for Amazon, being as they are usually very
secretive about revealing company or product information. They are even more so
when it comes to their cash-cow AWS, which Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos in April 2015
referred to as a rapidly growing US$5 billion dollar business.
Located
in Accomack County, Virginia, the project is a massive 1000 acre 80 MW Solar
Farm being built in partnership with Community Energy, a Solar Utility company who
specializes in designing and provisioning Solar Farms.
Community
Energy has been busy trying to get the necessary approvals to build the Solar
Plant as explained in “80-megawatt
solar facility coming to Accomack County”, published February 1, 2015 by
Eastern Shore News, News Leader.
So
why is Amazon suddenly so open about their latest venture, seeing as it has
nothing to do with any of their latest products in the pipeline, such as Amazon
Prime air as detailed in my blog article
entitled “Amazon’s
Prime Air Patent – How Swarm Intelligence pilots @Amazon Autonomous Drones via
White Spaces Network with Call Center Agent Personal Touch?”
Because
of GreenPeace, that's why!
Amazon reveals plans
for US$150 million Amazon Solar Farm US East – Cloud Computing generates
GreenHouse Gases
The
Cloud Computing field is a rapidly expanding business area for Corporate and
Enterprise businesses in the Technology Industry. US$5 billion dollars per
annum is a lot of corn to be making from this growing trend towards using Cloud
Storage and Cloud Computing.
It's
also fiercely competitive, with the likes of Microsoft, Google, Dell and Oracle
expanding the footprint of their Server Farms in a bid to ride this Cloud
computing Wave for Corporate,
Enterprise
and Consumer market customers.
However,
this has not been without controversy, especially as these Server Farms are
known to consume vast amounts of electrical energy, often derived from Coal and
LNG Power Plants which contribute indirectly to increased Carbon Dioxide
pollution.
Then
there is also their continued use of CFC (Chloro-Flouro-Carbon), a pollutant
which causes damage to the Ozone Layer which is generated due to leakage from
compressors from their excessive use of Air Conditioning in their Environmental
Control Systems.
Many
companies running Server Farms have been criticized for this and Amazon is no
exception, with Greenpeace publishing a
letter from nineteen (19) of their AWS Customers who prodded Amazon to
reveal the source of Power they use for their Cloud Server Data Farms.
Thus
Amazon, finding themselves the targets of this rather aggressive environmental
activist, revealed their plans in a bid to calm AWS customers like Huffington
Post, Upworthy and Tumblr who apparently were upset that they were not being a
good company.
Hence,
a few days later Amazon responded to Greenpeace's accusations with an AWS
(Amazon Web Services) Blog post detailing their Power sources and plans for
a switch to Alternative Energy!
Amazon Reveals AWS
Power Sources – Apple’s Solar Plans more detailed as Greenpeace suspicious
In
that AWS
(Amazon Web Services) Blog Amazon made a few points about their AWS power
usage:
1. AWS
used fewer Servers and less power than when the business did it themselves
2. 25%
of their AWS and infrastructure power came from Renewable Sources as of April
2015
3. 40%
of AWS and infrastructure power would be coming from Renewable Sources by 2016
Greenpeace
commented that this was not enough information, as it did not set a timetable
for when they'd achieve this lofty aim. Also, although Amazon revealed their
investment in the massive 1000 acre 80 MW Solar Farm being built in partnership
with Community Energy in Accomack County, Virginia, they did not reveal how
much of that US$150 million dollar was their investment.
Personally,
what got me suspicious about the figure is that it seems a lot cheaper than
Apple's planned 1,300-acre 130MW Solar Farm located in Monterey County in
California that is a partnership with Solar Utility company, First Solar as
detailed in my blog
article entitled “Apple's
US$848 million 1,300-acre Solar Farm - How First Solar is decoupling Green
Apple from the Grid using Renewable Energy”.
Apple's
Solar Farm investment disclosure not only details their investment of US$848
but how long they plan to take to build and pay for it, which is over a twenty
five (25) year span. So rather than answer more questions, AWS disclosure
raises more questions from this suspiciously secretive EMC3 (Earth's Most
Customer Centric Company).
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