Facebook has announced a commitment to power its global operations with 100% renewables and reduce its greenhouse-gas emissions 75% by the end of 2020.
In 2015, Facebook set a goal of supporting 50% of its facilities with renewables by 2018. The company has achieved that goal a year early, reaching 51% clean and renewable energy in 2017.
In a record-breaking year of corporate renewable energy purchases, Facebook is on track to be one of the largest corporate purchasers of renewable energy. Since its first purchase of wind power in 2013, Facebook has signed contracts for over 3 GW of new wind and solar energy, that includes over 2,500 MW in just the past 12 months.
“We are proud of the impact our renewable energy program is having on local communities and the market in general. All of these wind and solar projects are new and on the same grid as our data centers. That means that each of these projects brings jobs, investment and a healthier environment to the communities that host us — from Prineville, Oregon, and Los Lunas, New Mexico, to Henrico, Virginia, and Luleå, Sweden,” the company commented in a recent press statement.
Facebook says it works to enable access to renewable energy resources for other companies and organizations by building infrastructure, opening projects to other buyers or establishing green tariffs, which allow customers to buy renewable energy from their local utilities.
Last year, Facebook pledged its support for climate action by supporting the Paris Agreement through the ‘We Are Still In’ initiative. The targets we are sharing today are part of that promise.
Filed Under: News, Policy
