This is AWS’s fifth renewable energy project globally and its second
wind farm in Ohio
Amazon Wind Farm US Central 2 is expected to generate more than
530,000 MWh of energy annually, enough to power approximately 50,000 US
homes per year
Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), an Amazon.com company (NASDAQ:AMZN),
today announced Amazon Wind Farm US Central 2, a new 189 megawatt (MW)
wind farm in Hardin County, Ohio that will generate 530,000 megawatt
hours (MWh) of wind energy annually starting in December 2017. Amazon
engaged with EverPower, a leader in utility grade wind projects, to
construct, own, and operate the new wind farm. This is AWS’s fifth
renewable energy project in the United States (and its second wind farm
in Ohio) that will deliver energy onto the electric grid powering AWS
data centers located in the AWS US East (Ohio) and AWS US East (N.
Virginia) Regions. When this newest wind farm is completed, AWS’s five
renewable energy projects will generate a grand total of 2.2 million MWh
of energy annually – enough to power almost 200,000 U.S. homes1.
For more information, go to https://aws.amazon.com/sustainability.
In November 2014, AWS shared its long-term commitment to achieve 100
percent renewable energy usage for the global AWS infrastructure
footprint. Ambitious sustainability initiatives over the last 18-24
months have put AWS on track to exceed its 2016 goal of 40 percent
renewable energy use and enabled AWS to set a new goal to be powered by
50 percent renewable energy by the end of 2017. In addition to investing
in wind and solar projects that deliver more renewable energy to the
electrical grids that power AWS Cloud data centers, AWS continues to
innovate in its facilities and equipment to increase energy efficiency,
as well as to advocate for federal and state policies aimed at creating
a favorable renewable energy environment. For example, in Ohio, Amazon
supports proposed changes to the state’s current wind setbacks
law to encourage more investment in new renewable wind power projects.
This second Ohio wind project joins Amazon
Wind Farm US Central (100MW) in Paulding County, which AWS announced
in November 2015 and will start producing wind energy in May 2017. Other
AWS renewable energy projects in the US include Amazon Wind Farm Fowler
Ridge (100MW) in Indiana and Amazon Solar Farm US East (80MW) in
Virginia – both of which are currently in production. Amazon Wind Farm
US East (280MW) in North Carolina is under construction and expected to
start generating electricity by December 2016.
"We remain committed to achieving our long-term goal of powering the AWS
Cloud with 100 percent renewable energy," said Peter DeSantis, Vice
President, Infrastructure, AWS. “There are lots of things that go into
making this a reality, including governments implementing policies that
stimulate cost-effective renewable energy production, businesses that
buy that energy, economical renewable projects from our development
partners and utilities, as well as technological and operational
innovation that drives greater efficiencies in our global
infrastructure. We continue to push on all of these fronts to stay well
ahead of our renewable energy goals.”
“We applaud Amazon’s goal to power the global infrastructure for the
industry-leading AWS Cloud with renewable energy and are pleased to
collaborate in this effort. Leading companies like AWS are enabling the
construction of large, utility-scale renewable power projects that will
ultimately help to off-set the energy supplied by fossil fuels and
create a cleaner, healthier environment for our communities,” said Jim
Spencer, CEO of EverPower, a US leader in wind projects. EverPower has
seven active projects in four states producing a total 752 MW of energy,
with a near-term pipeline of an additional 2,000 MW.
Beyond the sustainability initiatives focused on powering the AWS global
infrastructure, Amazon is investing in several other clean energy
activities across the company. Examples of other projects include Amazon
Wind Farm Texas – a 253MW wind farm in Scurry County, Texas -- green
rooftops, and the District Energy Project that uses recycled energy for
heating Amazon offices in Seattle. For more information on Amazon’s
sustainability initiatives, visit www.amazon.com/sustainability.
About Amazon Web Services
For 10 years, Amazon Web Services has been the world’s most
comprehensive and broadly adopted cloud platform. AWS offers over 70
fully featured services for compute, storage, databases, analytics,
mobile, Internet of Things (IoT) and enterprise applications from 38
Availability Zones (AZs) across 14 geographic regions in the U.S.,
Australia, Brazil, China, Germany, Ireland, Japan, Korea, Singapore, and
India. AWS services are trusted by more than a million active customers
around the world – including the fastest growing startups, largest
enterprises, and leading government agencies – to power their
infrastructure, make them more agile, and lower costs. To learn more
about AWS, visit http://aws.amazon.com.
About Amazon
Amazon is guided by four principles: customer obsession rather than
competitor focus, passion for invention, commitment to operational
excellence, and long-term thinking. Customer reviews, 1-Click shopping,
personalized recommendations, Prime, Fulfillment by Amazon, AWS, Kindle
Direct Publishing, Kindle, Fire tablets, Fire TV, Amazon Echo, and Alexa
are some of the products and services pioneered by Amazon. For more
information, visit www.amazon.com/about.
About EverPower
EverPower Wind Holdings, Inc., headquartered in Pittsburgh, is a
developer, owner and operator of utility grade wind projects. Since its
founding in 2002, EverPower has used a partnership approach with
landowners and communities to establish itself as premier developer,
owner, and operator of wind projects in the U.S. EverPower currently has
seven operational wind facilities with nameplate capacity of
approximately 752 MW. EverPower has been owned by Terra Firma Capital
Partners, a European private equity firm, since 2009. For more
information, visit www.everpower.com.
1 In 2012, the average annual electricity consumption for a
U.S. residential utility customer was 10,837 kWh, an average of 903
kilowatt-hours (kWh) per month. http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=97&t=3
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