Facebook Expanding Renewables Footprint With Big Solar, Wind Buy

Brian Eckhouse (Bloomberg) -- Facebook Inc. is buying a huge amount of clean power across the U.S. and Ireland to support its operations.

The social-media giant -- already one of the world’s biggest corporate consumers of renewable energy -- signed contracts to buy 806 megawatts of additional solar and wind power, the company said. The contracts support eight projects in Utah, Ohio, Illinois, Tennessee and Ireland, and involve several different developers, including Brookfield Renewable Partners LP, D.E. Shaw Renewable Investments and Apex Clean Energy.

Corporate appetite for cheap clean power has been a big recent driver of wind and solar growth in the U.S. and beyond. Tech giants including Facebook have led that push, in part to power their data centers.

Facebook has deals for more than 5 gigawatts of clean power, 2 gigawatts of which is operating today. It expects another 1.5 gigawatts of wind and solar power to come online by year-end.