Apple announced that renewable energy is powering all its global facilities including retail stores, offices, data centers and co-located facilities in 43 countries — including the United States, the United Kingdom, China and India.
The company also announced nine additional manufacturing partners have committed to power all of their Apple production with 100 percent clean energy, bringing the total number of supplier commitments to 23.
“We’re going to keep pushing the boundaries of what is possible with the materials in our products, the way we recycle them, our facilities and our work with suppliers to establish new creative and forward-looking sources of renewable energy because we know the future depends on it,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO.
Apple said its renewable energy projects represent a range of energy sources, including solar arrays and wind farms as well as emerging technologies like biogas fuel cells, micro-hydro generation systems and energy storage technologies.
Apple currently has 25 operational renewable energy projects, totaling 626 megawatts of generation capacity, with 286 megawatts of solar PV generation coming online in 2017. It also has 15 more projects in construction. Once built, over 1.4 gigawatts of clean renewable energy generation will be spread across 11 countries.
Since 2014, all of Apple’s data centers have been powered by 100 percent renewable energy. Since 2011, all of Apple’s renewable energy projects have reduced greenhouse gas emissions (CO2e) by 54 percent from its facilities worldwide and prevented nearly 2.1 million metric tons of CO2e from entering the atmosphere.
Apple’s renewable energy projects
Park, Apple’s new headquarters in Cupertino, is the largest LEED Platinum-certified office building in North America. It is powered by 100 percent renewable energy from multiple sources, including a 17-megawatt onsite rooftop solar installation and four megawatts of biogas fuel cells, and controlled by a microgrid with battery storage. It also gives clean energy back to the public grid during periods of low occupancy.
Over 485 megawatts of wind and solar projects have been developed across six provinces of China to address upstream manufacturing emissions.
Apple recently announced plans to build a 400,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art data center in Waukee, Iowa, that will run entirely on renewable energy from day one.
In Prineville, Oregon, the company signed a 200-megawatt power purchase agreement for an Oregon wind farm, the Montague Wind Power Project, set to come online by the end of 2019.
In Reno, Nevada, Apple created a partnership with the local utility, NV Energy, and over the last four years developed four new projects totaling 320 megawatts of solar PV generation.
In Japan, Apple is partnering with local solar company Daini Denryoku to install over 300 rooftop solar systems that will generate 18,000 megawatt-hours of clean energy every year — enough to power more than 3,000 Japanese homes.
Apple’s data center in Maiden, North Carolina, is supported by projects that generate 244 million kilowatt-hours of renewable energy per year, which is equivalent to the energy used by 17,906 North Carolina homes.
In Singapore, Apple adapted and built its renewable energy on 800 rooftops.
Apple is currently constructing two new data centers in Denmark that will run on 100 percent renewable energy from day one.
Apple also announced that 23 of its suppliers are now committed to operating on 100 percent renewable energy, including nine new suppliers.