Earlier this month, Greenpeace showered praise on Apple for its commitment to green energy despite the company’s decision to locate its newest data center in North Carolina, which the environmental organization says has one of the dirtiest electrical grids in the United States. NBC’s Today was given the opportunity to check out the facility and sent chief environmental correspondent Anne Thompson to speak with Apple’s Lisa Jackson about the benefits of renewable energy and the huge amount of power required to run a data center.
In the segment, we get a look at the largest privately-owned solar farm in the United States. These solar panels, which run on biogas fuel cells, allow the corporation to run its facility on 100% renewable energy and they create enough electricity to light up 14,000 homes a year.
“We think that this is an opportunity for us and for our sector to leave it better than we find it; to actually help people to convert to cleaner energy without even knowing they’re doing it,” says Jackson.
It was especially sunny on the day of the visit, and Jackson said that on those days, the solar farm is “actually generating excess power, and [Apple] can put that on the grid for other customers to use.”
The video of Thompson’s on-site visit follows below.
