Amazon Web Services (AWS) has announced its fifth renewable energy project in the USA – a 189MW wind farm.
To be constructed in Hardin County, Ohio and completed late next year, the facility will generate 530,000 megawatt hours (MWh) of clean electricity annually.
Combined with its other four projects, AWS’s collective capacity will generate 2.2 million MWh of energy each year; enough to supply the electricity needs of almost 200,000 U.S. households.
The other projects are:
- Amazon Wind Farm US Central (100MW) in Paulding County, Ohio
- Amazon Wind Farm Fowler Ridge (100MW) in Indiana
- Amazon Solar Farm US East (80MW) in Virginia
- Amazon Wind Farm US East (280MW) in North Carolina
In September, the company also announced the Amazon Wind Farm Texas project, which will be a 253-megawatt power station in Scurry County.
“We remain committed to achieving our long-term goal of powering the AWS Cloud with 100 percent renewable energy,” said Peter DeSantis, Vice President, Infrastructure, AWS.
The company has come a long way since Greenpeace criticised the cloud-computing sector – including Amazon Web Services – for its carbon footprint. At that point in 2014, Greenpeace estimated AWS to be sourcing around 12% of its electricity from renewable sources.
“Amazon Web Services (AWS), which provides the infrastructure for a significant part of the internet, remains among the dirtiest and least transparent companies in the sector, far behind its major competitors,” stated Greenpeace (PDF) at the time.
Things changed quickly at AWS after that report was published.
By April 2015, approximately 25% of the power consumed by its global infrastructure was from renewables. AWS says it is on track to better its 2016 goal of 40 percent renewable energy; enabling it to set a new goal of 50 percent renewable energy by the end of 2017.
AWS states it also continuing to boost energy efficiency across its operations, and to lobby for renewable energy friendly policies at a U.S. state and federal level.
AWS says customers can benefit from a reduction in carbon emissions of 88% by moving to the cloud and AWS. It also offers four separate carbon-neutral regions for customers to utilize.
Further information on AWS’s sustainability efforts can be viewed here.
