Amazon Web Services (AWS), a branch of the online retailer that focuses on cloud computing, is to use wind energy to power its data centres.
AWS is working with Iberdrola Renewables to construct and operate a 208MW wind farm in North Carolina, to be called the Amazon Wind Farm US East.
The plant will be operational in December 2016, and will generate about 670,000 MWh of energy annually, enough to power 61,000 homes.
AWS plans to be powered completely by renewable energy in the future. As of April 2015, some 25% of the power consumed by its global infrastructure comes from renewable energy sources.
AWS aims to increase this to 40% by the end of 2016.
Together with Amazon Wind Farm US East, Amazon’s renewable projects will be responsible for delivering more than 1.3 million MWh of additional renewable energy into electric grids across the central and eastern US.
Jerry Hunter, AWS vice president of infrastructure, said: "We’re far from being done. We’ll continue pursuing projects that deliver clean energy to the various energy grids that serve AWS data centres, we’ll continue working with our power providers to increase their renewable energy quotient, and we’ll continue to strongly encourage our partners in government to extend the tax incentives that make it more viable for renewable projects to get off the ground."
Iberdrola is a Spanish electric utility company that has a workforce of more than 31,000 employees across four continents.
Image: Smoky Hills Wind Farm, Kansas, USA (Wikimedia Commons)
