Facebook sets 2020 renewable energy and greenhouse gas targets

Facebook CEO Mark
Zuckerberg.
Chip
Somodevilla/Getty

• Facebook will be powered by 100% renewable energy by
  2020, the company has promised.
• In new goals published on Tuesday, Facebook also said
  it would cut its greenhouse gas emissions 75% over the same
  timeframe.
• Tech giants like Facebook, Google, Amazon, and Apple,
  consume extraordinary quantities of electricity to power their
  global networks of data centres and infrastructure.

Facebook is determined to make its energy-guzzling data centres
more environmentally friendly.

On Tuesday, the Silicon Valley tech giant announced that it has
set itself a target of powering its operations with 100%
renewable energy “by the end of 2020.” It’s also publicly
promising to cut its greenhouse gas emissions 75% over the same
timeframe, using 2016 as a base year.

The two goals are a significant new commitment towards green
energy for Facebook, building on previous targets and giving it
new concrete, measurable goals to work towards.

Tech giants like Facebook, Google, Amazon, and Apple, consume
extraordinary quantities of electricity to power their global
networks of data centres and infrastructure.

These have the capacity to significantly contribute to global
greenhouse emissions — though most of the major tech firms have
made pledges towards renewable energy with varying levels of
specificity.

In a 2017 report assessing the environmental credentials of tech
firms, Greenpeace scored Apple most highly — hailing it as “among
the most aggressive in the sector in its efforts to power its
online platform with renewable energy.”

Facebook also got an A-grade, with Greenpeace commending it:
“Facebook was the first major internet company to commit to be
100% renewably powered and continues to play a leadership role
within the sector. Showing strong transparency and a track record
of its five latest data centers sighted in locations that allowed
them to be renewably powered.”

Google is “improving its renewable energy deployment in new
markets to keep pace with its rapid growth,” Greenpeace said, but
it “still has significant room to improve in regards to
transparency.”

Facebook previously set itself a goal of 25% renewables by 2015,
and 50% by 2018 after that.

“We work with utilities, renewable energy developers and industry
groups to share our learnings and approaches with other
companies. When doing so, we bring an open and innovative
approach to finding renewable energy solutions that fit our needs
and can move energy markets forward,” Facebook said in a press
release.

“We work to enable access to renewable energy resources for other
companies and organizations through green tariffs, building
infrastructure or opening projects to other buyers.”

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