Apple today announced its global facilities are powered with 100 percent clean energy. This achievement includes retail stores, offices, data centers and co-located facilities in 43 countries — including the United States, the United Kingdom, China and India. The company also announced nine additional manufacturing partners have committed to power all of their Apple production with 100 percent clean energy, bringing the total number of supplier commitments to 23.
“We’re committed to leaving the world better than we found it. After years of hard work we’re proud to have reached this significant milestone,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO, in the press release. “We’re going to keep pushing the boundaries of what is possible with the materials in our products, the way we recycle them, our facilities and our work with suppliers to establish new creative and forward-looking sources of renewable energy because we know the future depends on it.”
Renewable Energy Projects
Apple and its partners are building new renewable energy projects around the world, improving the energy options for local communities, states and even entire countries. Apple creates or develops, with utilities, new regional renewable energy projects that would not otherwise exist. These projects represent a diverse range of energy sources, including solar arrays and wind farms as well as emerging technologies like biogas fuel cells, micro-hydro generation systems and energy storage technologies.
Apple currently has 25 operational renewable energy projects around the world, totaling 626 megawatts of generation capacity, with 286 megawatts of solar PV generation coming online in 2017, its most ever in one year. It also has 15 more projects in construction. Once built, over 1.4 gigawatts of clean renewable energy generation will be spread across 11 countries.
Since 2014, all of Apple’s data centers have been powered by 100 percent renewable energy. And since 2011, all of Apple’s renewable energy projects have reduced greenhouse gas emissions (CO2e) by 54 percent from its facilities worldwide and prevented nearly 2.1 million metric tons of CO2e from entering the atmosphere.
Apple’s renewable energy projects include:
• Apple Park, Apple’s new headquarters in Cupertino, is now the largest LEED Platinum-certified office building in North America. It is powered by 100 percent renewable energy from multiple sources, including a 17-megawatt onsite rooftop solar installation and four megawatts of biogas fuel cells, and controlled by a microgrid with battery storage. It also gives clean energy back to the public grid during periods of low occupancy.
• Over 485 megawatts of wind and solar projects have been developed across six provinces of China to address upstream manufacturing emissions.
• Apple recently announced plans to build a 400,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art data center in Waukee, Iowa, that will run entirely on renewable energy from day one.
• In Prineville, Oregon, the company signed a 200-megawatt power purchase agreement for an Oregon wind farm, the Montague Wind Power Project, set to come online by the end of 2019.
• In Reno, Nevada, Apple created a partnership with the local utility, NV Energy, and over the last four years developed four new projects totaling 320 megawatts of solar PV generation.
• In Japan, Apple is partnering with local solar company Daini Denryoku to install over 300 rooftop solar systems that will generate 18,000 megawatt-hours of clean energy every year — enough to power more than 3,000 Japanese homes.
• Apple’s data center in Maiden, North Carolina, is supported by projects that generate 244 million kilowatt-hours of renewable energy per year, which is equivalent to the energy used by 17,906 North Carolina homes.
• In Singapore, where land is scarce, Apple adapted and built its renewable energy on 800 rooftops.
• Apple is currently constructing two new data centers in Denmark that will run on 100 percent renewable energy from day one.
Supplier Commitments
To get to 100 percent renewable energy for its own facilities, the company worked to set an example for others to follow. Apple also announced today that 23 of its suppliers are now committed to operating on 100 percent renewable energy, including nine new suppliers. Altogether, clean energy from supplier projects helped avoid over 1.5 million metric tons of greenhouse gases from being emitted in 2017 — the equivalent of taking more than 300,000 cars off the road. In addition, over 85 suppliers have registered for Apple’s Clean Energy Portal, an online platform that Apple developed to help suppliers identify commercially viable renewable energy solutions in regions around the world.
New supplier commitments include:
Arkema, a designer of high-performance bio-based polymers, which manufactures for Apple at its facilities in France, the United States and China.
• DSM Engineering Plastics, which manufactures polymers and compounds in the Netherlands, Taiwan and China that are used in many Apple products, including connectors and cables.
• ECCO Leather, the first soft goods supplier to commit to 100 percent clean energy for its Apple production. The leather that ECCO produces for Apple is of European origin, with tanning and cutting occurring at facilities in the Netherlands and China.
• Finisar, a US industry-leading producer of optical communication components and vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs), which power some of Apple’s most popular new features like Face ID, Portrait mode selfies and Animoji.
• Luxshare-ICT, a supplier of accessories for Apple products. Luxshare-ICT’s production for Apple is predominantly located in Eastern China.
• Pegatron, which assembles a number of products, including iPhone, at its two factories in Shanghai and Kunshan, China.
• Quadrant, a supplier of magnets and magnetic components in a number of Apple’s products.
• Quanta Computer, one of the first Mac suppliers to commit to 100 percent renewable energy for Apple production.
• Taiyo Ink Mfg. Co., which produces solder masks for printed circuit boards in Japan.
Source: Apple Inc.
MacDailyNews Note: In their most recent “Environmental Responsibility Report,” Apple calculated that the company’s annual comprehensive carbon footprint was 29.5 million metric tons.
SEE ALSO:
Apple to stick with environmental pledges despite President Trump’s gutting of Obama’s climate change orders – March 30, 2017
State-of-the-art floating solar island brings Apple’s clean energy program to Japan – March 8, 2017
Greenpeace: Apple again the world’s most environmentally friendly tech company – January 10, 2017
Apple continues supply chain transparency as Trump administration considers suspending conflict mineral requirements – March 27, 2017
Apple announces environmental progress in China; applauds supplier commitment to clean energy – August 17, 2016
Apple VP Jackson visits ‘solar mamas’ in Rajasthan – May 19, 2016
Apple will run all its operations in Singapore on solar power – November 17, 2015
Greenpeace: Apple is tech’s greenest – May 15, 2015
Greenpeace: Apple leading the way in creating a greener, more sustainable internet – April 2, 2014
Greenpeace praises Apple for reducing use of conflict minerals – February 13, 2014
Would that Apple’s commitment to the global warming lie be inferior, or at least equal, to their commitment to the Mac users who put them into the position to obsequiously virtue-signal with the regularity of an SJW on crack.
I entirely agree. Then again, if you were Apple CEO they’d have coal burning plants at every location. 😛 There’s this important factor of credibility, which you neglect.
Meanwhile: Bravo Apple! Bravo to ALL responsible companies and people who work for them in the world! This is a wonderful demonstration of positive capitalism, long- term thinking, long-term benefits. Life on miracle planet Earth, our only home, thanks you forever!
“If you were Apple CEO they’d have coal burning plants at every location.”
Actually, no.
… that the only thing Conservatives want to actually conserve is their own money? You seem to think that once you pass on so does the rest of the Earth, so why the hell should you care, eh.
Where did I say anything about money or conserving it?
Answer: Nowhere.
I think there is a simple way for First and Derek to work out their differences: They both go to the nearest beach and stand for ten minutes in the water at high tide, with Derek’s nostrils just above the 2018 high tide level and First’s just above the 1918 high tide level, which will not have changed since global warming is a lie.
May the best man win.
More seriously, making products and buying electricity to produce those products are hardly incompatible goals. I posted over the weekend that (at least under some circumstances) it is possible to save money by using renewable sources of electricity—a couple of US cities are already doing so. Even apart from alleged SJW motives, saving money seems like a legitimate business purpose for a corporate CEO.
In your typical haste to spew scorn on man made climate change, quoting the Daily Beast article…you obviously forgot to read it. Nowhere does it say global warming is a “lie”. It just says that we may have a bit more time to limit warming to 1.5degC than the worst imagined scenario due mainly to China’s Herculean efforts to replace coal with solar and wind power.
In case you miss the point, China’s efforts have proven that direct action, as envisaged by the Paris Agreement, has an immediate measurable effect on atmospheric greenhouse gases.
Quite the opposite of exposing a lie It simply enforces the measures necessary:
Co-author Professor Michael Grubb of University College London, concludes: ‘This paper shows that the Paris goals are within reach, but clarifies what the commitment to ‘pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C’ really implies.
‘Starting with the global review due next year, countries have to get out of coal and strengthen their existing targets…
So you just think folk will accept your baseless lies? No chance.
This isn’t surprising. The whole denier movement is built on quoting scientists completely out of context. In this case, “It may not be geophysically impossible to hold mid-range warming to 1.5 degrees, because China is curbing its CO2 emissions far more aggressively than anyone expected” is quoted as “There is no need for anybody to curb emissions, because global warming is a lie.” In other words, “War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength.”
Exactly right. Orwellian Newspeak is with us. As a girl I was taught to read Nineteen Eighty-four as a metaphor, or as a cautionary tale, so I never expected it to come true. We are living a nightmare in which our schoolyard bullies grew up to take over politics and scientists were sent into exile. It’s exactly like Back to the Future. One can only hope that in the end, Biff gets manure dumped on him.
I’m actually convinced the world now teeters twixt Orwellian and Huxley’n opposing nightmares. Are we ruled and oppressed by our fears, hate and disinformation or by our proclivities, escapism and passivity?
Reality is claimed by both sides, though neither is desirable.
MDN is a lost cause in my book. I’m permanently banned, at least my IP address is, even though my posts have only ever pointed out obvious lies or I’ve indulged in heavy irony when the stupidity heap is overflowing. F.Whatever is a clear case of both all the way from his wailing about the Obama ‘Birther’ conspiracy, via ‘guns for everybody’ to ‘global warming is a lie’. I simply cannot stand by and let the lie stand. I’m a scientist, a precision engineer, I have stuff flying in space for chrissake. Precision is in my blood so thanks for your many corrective and let’s be honest, legally precise factual posts.
MDN is deliberately sanctioning the alt right viewpoint and suppressing dissenters. Many of my direct responses to botty, goeb and fwhatever are sumarily wiped – no explanation, whilst the usual suspects continue in their foul mouthed protective bubble. Mendacity is rife and the band of truth seekers capable of juggling two opposing thoughts is dwindling. But not extinct.
Botvinnik, GoeB, and applecynic should be banished on the grounds of having asinine opinions, inciting incivility, denying reality, and bullying.
happen. The best way to deal with trolls and bullies is to stop replying to them. Stop feeding the trolls everyone! They will wither and die if you just don’t reply to their stupidity.
The world is moving towards renewable energy whether you like it or not. It boggles the mind why you, or anyone else, would oppose it.
Goes to show how poor our education system is. Grown adults do not know the first thing about how stuff works. How fossil fuel combustion produces the greenhouse gas, CO2 — which has increased by 33% in just the last 150 years. Or about scientific method, data analysis, statistics, and evidence-based decision making. It is scary, really, how many ignoramuses this country has.
Let’s have clean energy, GW ‘lie’ or not.
Anthropogenic global warming is confirmed a scientific theory as evolution and atoms. You can call it a lie all you want, but you’re wrong.
That “97% of climate scientists agree” number that you hear so much almost implies that maybe the other 3% are on to something. In fact, the other 3% are almost without exception poorly designed/executed studies in off-topic journals, unreviewed by actual climate scientists and worse: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00704-015-1597-5
If you read through that article (which I doubt you will), it’s safe to say that 100% of sound scientific studies into anthropogenic climate change agree that it’s real and profound. That’s not just a consensus, it’s what us scientists call a scientific theory, e.g. a well-substantiated and reproducible explanation of some aspect of the natural world that can incorporate facts, laws, inferences and tested hypotheses.
So, if you wish to debate anthropogenic climate change, you need to go back to any of the scientifically well-vetted studies and find their flaws so we can debate the findings instead of spouting off with secondary and tertiary references from popular media. It’s fairly clear you’ve never read primary literature on this topic. It really is settled. You may not like it, but I don’t like other sad realities either like massive federal deficits and you don’t hear me saying the budget is balanced.
100% renewable energy goal met.
NOW we can get on with updating the Mac Mini and the iPad Mini…..
I’m not sure about any of that stuff you want is going to happen but you can go out and buy a RED iPhone to help AIDS/HIV victims. That’s Apple’s main focus, so get with the program.
The only thing that matters when it comes to Apple is how many iPhones they can sell. Anything else Apple does is deemed unimportant or considered a waste of time. Anything Apple can’t turn into profits means Apple is doomed. It’s always the same ugly story.
Well it’s amazing that the richest company in the world could pull off such a goal, and yet still cannot ship a battery charging pad… great job Tim.
I am all for using renewables, but Apple is doing some greenwashing.
1- The globalist production scheme used by Apple shuffles parts all over the globe and I would love to see the calculated carbon footprint for that. They also commonly fly finished products to markets in cargo jets- again a huge carbon footprint.
2-The planned obsolescence of the closed designs Apple uses is highly inefficient in terms of embodied energy. Longer life cycle products that are repairable would have far less environmental impact.
Contrary to the disinformation mostly provided by people paid by those who produce the dirtiest energy in the world, climate change is real, it is at least in part caused by human activity and will profoundly change our one and only home. There is no optional second planet we can relocate to.
Peer reviewed science conducted by people who have researched this subject for their careers are in high accord that climate change is ongoing. To be honest, the trajectory of change is happening at the high range of projections made in the past- otherwise, they were more conservative than the data suggested.
To my theist friends here- Noah built the ark BEFORE the rains came.
However Noah had input from God and not Al Gore!
Amazing how many deniers there are when they are fans of products that are the result of the same science that shows unequivocally that the Earth is heating up as a result of human generated CO2
Geez. Cook always speaks like a VP, you know, explainting stuff instead of a CEO.
Samsung is 120% powered by renewable energy
Microsoft is powered 150% by re-old-able energy
(the power of using an old idea over and over again…uh-oh Apple!)
That explains the higher cost of products?:)
How exactly does Apple block electrons created from coal or natural gas from entering their stores and offices and only let the ones in that were created from wind or solar?
horse·shit
ˈhôr(s)ˌSHit
noun
NORTH AMERICAN vulgar slang
nonsense.