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The huge data centers that power the Internet could end up costing companies like Google millions more under a “cap and trade” carbon emissions reduction program.
That’s because most of the nation’s electricity is still produced by coal-fired power plants, and data centers are one of the fastest-growing consumers of electricity.
Google spends approximately $38 million a year on electricity for its data centers nationwide, and a carbon tax could increase that by as much as 50 percent or more.
Even though that money is chump change for Google, the company is aggressively investing in a project dubbed “RE < C,” an effort to create renewable energy sources that are cheaper than coal.
In England, where nearly all electricity comes from coal, a carbon reduction tax has already been implemented and no new data centers have been built.
Suggesting that some companies may simply move their power-hungry operations to other countries.
Jackson West has been noodling micro-hydro to run a server and network in the mountains of Washington.
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MDgreen
on May 27th, 2010
@ 7:29 am:
Natural Gas, not coal is the primary fuel source for electricity in the UK.
I am also curious where the statistic for 50% increases in electricity prices comes from. Projections based on analysis of APA and also experience with the EU ETS (including a December 2009 report from E. On) indicate that the impact of cap and trade mechanisms on end user electricity prices is, while difficult to measure precisely, on the order of 5%.