Apple has huge solar plans at N.C. data center
 

21/02/2012

Apple plans to power its massive North Carolina data center with the biggest end-user-owned solar farm in the country.

Apple Inc. said Monday that it plans to power its massive data center in North Carolina with equally massive solar and fuel-cell installations.
The company said the solar array, expected to cover much of 100 acres, will be the biggest end-user-owned installation in the country. Its capacity is estimated at 20 megawatts, supplying 42 million kilowatt hours of solar power annually.
The fuel-cell installation is estimated at 5 megawatts and will be fueled by biogas. Two likely suppliers of the fuel cells are Bloom Energy or FuelCell Energy .
 

Apple has already spent an estimated $1 billion to build the 500,000-square-foot data center in Maiden, N.C., which plays a major role in its iCloud storage and sync service and its Siri voice-activated personal assistant.
The fact that the company planned to build a large solar farm next to the data center has been known since last year but the exact size hadn't been revealed until Apple issued an environmental report Monday, along with a facilities report.
 

By  Business Journal