In December, the Bush administration,with flagrant disdain for action in theface of climate change, made sure that

the Bali Climate Conference of Parties(COP13) ended with a whimper. The del-egates pathetically agreed to spend thenext two years studying what to do afterthe first commitment period on carbonreductions ends in 2012. As the meet-ings drew to a close, negotiator KevinConrad of Papua New Guinea mockedthe Bush team’s leadership pretensionswith the words, “If for some reason youare not willing to lead, leave it to therest of us. Please get out of the way.”Within a day, possibly as an in-your-facereply, the Bush administration deniedCalifornia and other states the right to settheir own carbon caps.

While the U.S. nega-negotiators mortified a nation long renowned for its can-do innovations, two intrepidentrepreneurial billionaires are movingdecisively to take the nation where

the feds have beenunwilling to go.Google co-foundersLarry Page and SergeyBrin boldly launcheda multi-hundred mil-lion dollar initiativeaudaciously titled“Renewable EnergyCheaper than Coal,”or simply, RE<C.

RE<C consists ofR&D works, philanthropic grantmaking,strategic investments in breakthroughrenewable projects and a potential newbusiness line for the world’s largest internetsearch company. Twenty to 30 engineersand energy experts are being hired to leadthe in-house R&D effort, with several tensof millions of dollars budgeted in 2008 tofocus initially on advanced solar thermalpower systems, wind power technologies,enhanced geothermal systems and otherpotential breakthrough technologies.

Efficient Data Centers“We have gained expertise in designing

and building large-scale, energy-intensivefacilities by building efficient data cen-ters,” said Larry Page, Google’s presidentof products. “We want to apply the samecreativity and innovation to the chal-lenge of generating renewable electricityat globally significant scale, and produceit cheaper than from coal.”

“There has been tremendous workalready on renewable energy,” Page empha-sized. “Technologies have been developedthat can mature into industries capable ofproviding electricity cheaper than coal.”Google has set an ambitious near-termgoal. “Our goal is to produce 1 gigawatt ofrenewable energy capacity that is cheaperthan coal,” he said. “We are optimistic thiscan be done in years, not decades.” Onegigawatt powers a city the size of San Fran-cisco. Most of Google’s electric use is by theserver farms in its data centers.

“If we meet this goal,” said Page, “andlarge-scale renewable deployments arecheaper than coal, the world will have theoption to meet a substantial portion ofelectricity needs from renewable sourcesand significantly reduce carbon emissions.We expect this would be a good businessfor us as well.”

RE<C is just the most recent in a steadystream of energy-efficiency, greening andsolar initiatives Google has launched overthe past several years. The company isleaving no stone unturned. Google hasadopted a series of environmentally friend-ly policies, including giving $5,000 to anyemployee who buys a hybrid car, usingorganic ingredients in the all-you-can-eat-for-free cafeterias dotting the campus andbuying office furnishings made of recy-cled materials.

Better ComputersLast June, Google, Intel, Dell, IBM,

Microsoft and others started the ClimateSavers Computing Initiative to save elec-tricity in personal computers. “The aver-age desktop PC wastes nearly 50 percent ofits power, and the average server wastesone-third of its power,” noted Urs Hölzle,senior vice president for operations and aGoogle Fellow. The Initiative set a 90 per-cent efficiency target for power supplies,which promises to reduce CO2 emissionsby 54 million tons per year, while saving$5.5 billion in energy costs.

On June 16, the 9,200 solar photo-voltaic panels installed at the Googleplexheadquarters in Mountain View, Calif.,went live. The performance data for the1,600-kilowatt solar PV systems are view-able at google.com/corporate/solarpanels/

solartoday.org SOLAR TODAY20 Copyright © 2008 by the American Solar Energy Society Inc. All rights reserved.

SUSTAINABLE WORLDVIEW

Michael Totten

In the shade of a photovoltaic-roofed garage, Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Pagelast June plugged in a new RechargeIT plug-in hybrid car.

GO

OG

LE

RE<C: Google Searches the FutureGoogle races to make renewable energy cheaper than coal. An op-ed piece from an interested party.By Michael Totten

March/April 2008 21

home. At the high-profile event, theGoogle co-founders connected the first fewplug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) thatare available for employee use. (Googlealready provides hundreds of town bicyclesfor cruising around the big campus and isoffering bicycles to its several thousandemployees worldwide so each employeecan “keep fit and healthy, get to knowtheir city better and reduce the environ-mental impact of their journey to work.”)

Larry Brilliant, executive director ofGoogle.org, the philanthropic arm ofGoogle.com, also announced a $10 mil-lion grant initiative to advance PHEV com-mercialization, as well as the launching ofa partnership with Enterprise Rent-A-Carto lease 100 PHEVs for the campus, as thecars become available.

Green ToolsAt about the same time, a group of

inspired employees (Googlers), coming fromall facets and geographical locations of thecompany, spontaneously formed a “GreenIntergroup.” They meet regularly to brain-storm new ways to green Google opera-

tions. They promote green practices throughinnovative applications of Google’s myriadinternet tools, like Google Earth map mash-ups and Web-based plug-in “gadgets.”

For example, Google’s Sketch-up 3Dmodeling software is adding green com-ponents to its architectural design appli-cations, working with such groups as theU.S. Green Building Council, Depart-ment of Energy, National RenewableEnergy Laboratory, Rocky MountainInstitute, BuildingGreen.com and Archi-tecture for Humanity. An EnergyPlusplug-in for SketchUp was planned forrelease at the beginning of 2008. Theplug-in couples the EnergyPlus whole-building simulation engine to theSketchUp drawing program.

In SketchUp’s 3D Warehouse(sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse) can be found graphic models of 94 high-performance buildings, energy-effi-cient case studies collaboratively developed by DOE, the USGBC and Build-ingGreen.com. SketchUp and RMI aredeveloping “GreenUp,” which will pro-vide “Green Tips” for the SketchUp green

plug-in. SketchUp is also being used exten-sively in daylighting analyses with AGI.

Many other applications are being dis-cussed, and solar PV expert Joe McCabe hasdeveloped an open source BIPV (building-integrated photovoltaics) Designer softwareplug-in that he’s offered to SketchUp forintegrating with their suite of green plug-ins.

I spent most of 2007 on assignment atGoogle.org working with the climate andenergy team, directed by Dan Reicher, for-mer DOE assistant secretary for energy effi-ciency and renewable energy, and in recentyears a renewables entrepreneur. I wasbrought in by Aimée Christensen, Google’sclimate maven, to concentrate on how cli-mate and energy solutions could be accel-erated through the use of so-called Web 2.0tools that enable social collaboration,including wikis, crowdsourcing, peer-to-peer production and more. I’ll share moreabout this in my next column. ●

Michael Totten is chief adviser on climate,water and ecosystem services at Conserva-tion International. Contact him atm.totten@conservation.org.

Copyright © 2008 by the American Solar Energy Society Inc. All rights reserved.

“Our goal is to produce 1 gigawatt of renewable energy capacity,” says Larry Page.