iNVEZZ.com, Monday, February 17: Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG), the owner of the world’s most popular online search engine, has invested more than $1 billion in clean energy, a report by CNBC revealed yesterday. The substantial sum has been outlayed over the course of 15 investments in wind and solar power opportunities. One of these projects, the world’s largest solar thermal project, was brought into operation last week in the US.



In Friday’s trading, Google shares closed up 0.24 percent at $1,202.80. The company’s stock has gained more than seven percent so far this year.

**Clean energy**

Technology companies such as Google, Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB) are amongst the biggest consumers of energy and many of them are trying to make up for that by investing in clean and renewable energy. But none are more aggressive in these efforts than the online search giant.

“We’ve invested over a billion dollars in 15 projects that have the capacity to produce two gigawatts of power around the world, mostly in the U.S., but that’s the equivalent of Hoover’s Dam worth of power generation,” Google chief of energy and sustainability Rick Needham told the CNBC at the company’s headquarters in Mountain View, California.

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On Thursday, one of the projects in which the company has invested became operational. The solar thermal project, located in Ivanpah, near the California-Nevada border, is capable of producing enough electricity to power more than 140,000 homes in California.

CNBC quoted Macquarie Securities’ Ben Schachter as commenting: “Google is ahead of the pack and we’ll have to wait and see how it works out. They are certainly trying many different initiatives to figure out how best to manage their footprint in the environment, as well as how to manage the cost of all their energy.”



In its latest quarter, Google spent $2.25 billion on data centre and infrastructure spending, which account for a big part of the company’s total costs. Investing in alternative sources of energy to power its numerous data centres around the world could help the tech giant bring these costs down.

Needham said that about 34 percent of the company’s operations are powered by renewable energy, and noted that the company plans to drive up that percentage to 100 percent.



**As of Friday’s US close buy Google shares at $1,202.80**

**As of Friday’s US close sell Google shares at $1,202.80**

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