Google said it had invested in Taiwan’s New Green Power and could acquire up to 300 megawatts of renewable energy from the BlackRock fund-owned company to reduce its and its suppliers’ carbon emissions
Investors are exerting pressure on companies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with their operations and value chains. Big Tech firms have been among the most ambitious in their objectives.
Throughout its operations, Google endeavors to operate exclusively on carbon-free energy. However, the demand for data processing capacity to fuel artificial intelligence has increased emissions due to sector growth.
Amanda Peterson reports that Taiwan, which houses a data center and corporate offices and is a significant location for Google’s cloud technology, continues to rely on fossil fuels to produce nearly 85% of its electricity. Corio, the Global Head of
Data Center Energy at Google, disclosed this information to Reuters.
“The goal of this investment is really to support the build-out of a large-scale solar pipeline in Taiwan,” according to Corio.
Decarbonizing regions such as the Asia Pacific region may be more challenging due to the limited capacity of corporate consumers to purchase green power and the underdeveloped infrastructure.
Reuters was informed by David Giordano, BlackRock’s Global Head of Climate Infrastructure, that New Green Power, which was owned by a fund managed by the Climate Infrastructure division of BlackRock, was one of the most prominent solar developers and operators in Taiwan.
Corio stated that the investment was anticipated to fuel the equity and debt financing for constructing its 1 gigawatt (GW) pipeline. However, Google and BlackRock declined to disclose the size of the equity stake acquired in NGP.
According to BlackRock, Taiwan intends to install 20 gigawatts of solar capacity by 2025 and as much as 80 gigawatts by 2050.
Corio stated that Google could provide a portion of the solar power it purchases to its regional suppliers and manufacturers and use it to fuel its operations.
She also stated that Google could reduce its Scope 3 emissions associated with its value chain by sharing information with suppliers.