Internet retail and web services giant Amazon has announced it is to invest in a second wind energy project in Ireland.

The company says the wind farm will be based in County Cork and will provide 23.2 megawatts of renewable capacity, generating 68,000 megawatt hours of clean energy annually.

Amazon will buy the energy produced by the wind farm under an unsubsidised power purchase agreement.

The company's first Irish wind energy project, in Meenbog, County Donegal, was announced in March and is being developed by Invis Energy.

The electricity generated by the wind farms will be used to supply the company's Amazon Web Services data centres in Ireland, which provide cloud based services to businesses all over the world.

"Playing a significant role in helping to reduce the sources of human-induced climate change is an important commitment for Amazon," said Kara Hurst, Director of Sustainability, Amazon.

"Major investments in renewable energy are a critical step to address our carbon footprint globally. We will continue to invest in these projects, and look forward to additional investments this year and beyond."

The investment was welcomed by the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Richard Bruton, who said that industry leadership was key to achieving Ireland's renewable energy targets.

"This project is another example of AWS's commitment to renewable projects in Ireland, adding clean energy to the grid, and supporting Ireland's climate commitments," he said.

Construction on the project will begin later this year and the wind farm is expected to begin contributing to Ireland's renewable energy capacity by 2020.

Amazon also announced its latest renewable energy project in the US, a solar farm to be located in Pittsylvania County, Virginia.

Once complete, it will provide 45 megawatts of renewable capacity and is expected to generate 100,000 megawatt hours of clean energy annually.