In a blog post published at the start of April, Google reported that it now purchases more electricity from wind and solar farms than it actually needs. The search engine operator currently purchases 3 GW of electricity from renewable energy projects. This does not, however, mean that all its data centers and offices are powered by electricity from responsible sources. The conditions at many sites make this impossible, explained Urs Hölzle, Senior Vice President, Technical Infrastructure. Instead, in 2017, for every kilowatt-hour of energy consumed, a kilowatt-hour of renewable energy was added to the grid. Moreover, Google purchases energy from wind and solar farms built specifically for the corporation.

A few days later, Apple also announced that all its offices, data centers, and stores are 100% powered by renewable energies. This is not, however, the case for its iPhone & co. production plants. 23 suppliers currently declare to be 100% powered by environmentally-friendly electricity, but Taiwanese company Foxconn – one of the largest production plants – is not among these suppliers. Overall, Apple works with several hundred suppliers.