Energy rating: Apple top, Amazon flop
Greenpeace compiles an annual Clean Energy Index of Internet companies. Apple and Google are at the top thanks to their use of renewable energies.
According to the report, Apple, Facebook, Google and HP operate at least half of their data centers with climate-friendly green electricity. By contrast, Amazon, for example, continues to rely on coal and nuclear power, according to the latest edition of Greenpeace's "Green Click" report. As more and more people worldwide use cloud and streaming services, energy demand is also rising sharply. "Internet users already consume gigantic amounts of electricity when streaming music and movies. If the Internet were a country, it would have the world's sixth-largest electricity consumption," says Niklas Schinerl, energy expert at Greenpeace. To ensure that the Internet industry also makes a contribution to climate protection, Greenpeace is calling on all Internet and electronics companies to switch their energy requirements to renewable energies.
The Greenpeace report examines the supply chain of the world's 15 leading cloud computing and colocation providers and shows how the energy for their data centers is produced. With 83 percent of its electricity coming from renewable sources, Apple takes the top spot for the third year in a row, followed by Facebook (67 percent), Google (56 percent) and HP (50 percent). Amazon Web Services (AWS), a company that hosts data from operators such as Netflix, Pinterest and Spotify, does particularly poorly among the well-known Internet corporations. AWS data centers get 30 percent of their electricity from coal-fired power, 26 percent from nuclear power and 24 percent from gas-fired power plants. Only 17 percent comes from renewable sources.
Amazon, Netflix, Pinterest and Spotify rely on coal and nuclear
Largely powered by coal and nuclear electricity, AWS also operates Netflix, a rapidly growing streaming provider that now has about 83 million subscribers worldwide. At peak times, series and feature films streamed via Netflix account for more than a third of data traffic in North America. "If Amazon, Netflix and others don't move quickly and consistently to renewables, they're going to become a dirty corner of climate change," Schinerl says. Netflix host AWS, for example, uses data centers in the U.S. state of Virginia, which has the nation's lowest percentage of renewable electricity. Greenpeace also criticizes the lack of transparency in the power supply of Amazon servers, including in Germany.
Since 2009, Greenpeace has been committed to sustainable energy supply in the IT sector. In 2017, the sector will consume three times as much electricity as Germany. Facebook, Apple and Google committed to 100 percent renewable energy four years ago. Meanwhile, 20 companies, including cloud and colocation providers, pledge to meet their energy needs exclusively with renewables. The Greenpeace report shows the differences in the commitment of these Internet and electronics companies.
Source: Greenpeace
