Google says it will run entirely on renewable energy by 2017

The tech giant will purchase 2.6 gigawatts of wind and solar energy, globally

Google has announced that it will fulfil 100% of its energy needs through renewable sources by 2017.

In 2012 we set a goal to run our company on 100% renewable energy. We’ll reach it in 2017, a year ahead of schedule. https://t.co/gkJP1Jia4N pic.twitter.com/JcZTrcX9PL

— Google (@Google) December 6, 2016

“I’m thrilled to announce that in 2017 Google will reach 100% renewable energy for our global operations — including both our data centers and offices,”  senior vice president of Google’s technical infrastructure Urs Hölzle wrote in a blog post.



Just to give you an idea of how much energy Google’s servers need to power its products and services, consider that every year people search on Google trillions of times and every minute people upload more than 400 hours of YouTube videos.



To reach its goal of 100% reliance on renewable energy, Hölzle said, “We’ll be directly buying enough wind and solar electricity annually to account for every unit of electricity our operations consume, globally. And we're focusing on creating new energy from renewable sources, so we only buy from projects that are funded by our purchases. ”

The company also claimed that it is the world’s largest corporate buyer of renewable power, with commitments to purchase 2.6 gigawatts (2,600 megawatts) of wind and solar energy, globally.