The News: More news out of Climate Week NYC 2022 is word of Amazon’s expansion of renewable energy projects, with “firsts” in Brazil, India, and Poland, making a total of 379 renewable energy projects in the works to date. Read more from Amazon here.
Analyst Take: Amazon’s expansion of its renewable energy projects – consisting of 154 wind and solar farms, 225 rooftop solar projects (representing 18.5 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity across 21 countries) — announced last week at Climate Week NYC 2022 — is impressive by any measure. Equally exciting is news of “firsts” by way of new projects in Brazil (which is the company’s first in South American), as well as India, and Poland, where there are now solar farms.
As the world’s largest global corporate purchaser of renewable energy globally, and a company with a goal of reaching 100% renewable energy across the entirety of its business by 2025 — a short three years from now — there’s no time to waste. Although it’s important to note here that as of last year (2021) Amazon had already reached 85% renewable energy across its business, so it’s clear the company is wasting no time barreling toward that already impressive 2025 goal. These renewable energy projects are powering and will power Amazon data centers, fulfillment centers, offices and more.
How big is this? In a word: BIG! Once fully operational, Amazon’s global energy portfolio will generate 50,000 gigawatt-hours of clean energy, the equivalent of the amount of electricity needed to power 4.6 million homes in the U.S. each year.
Also probably important to note that in order to help scale the benefits of its investments in renewables, Amazon is working with the Clean Energy Buyers Institute (CEBI)’s Beyond the Megawatt initiative to insure the industry is maximizing the economic, environmental, and social impact of energy procurement. Not only is Amazon deploying these kinds of initiatives, the company is setting a leading example by investing in renewables and investing in companies developing clean energy solutions, sustainable supply chains, and next gen procurement tools.
Lauren Kirkpatrick, my colleague and fellow analyst here at Futurum Research, and I covered this on an episode of our newly launched Good Equals Progress webcast, a show designed to cover all things sustainability.
Here’s a video vignette of the coverage specific to Amazon’s expansion of its renewable energy projects:
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Good Equals Progress provides industry research and analysis on the topics of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI). These columns are for educational purposes only and should not be considered in any way investment advice.
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Transcript:
Shelly Kramer: Some more news coming out this week. Amazon has expanded its renewable energy projects with firsts in Brazil and India and Poland. So what’s cool about this is that Amazon’s news is that it’s expanded its renewable energy investments. It’s added a whopping 71 new projects. And this includes projects in Brazil, India, and Poland.
And that brings the total of the company’s renewable energy projects to 379, which is no small number. And it consists of 154 wind and solar farms, 225 rooftop solar projects, representing a not at all small 18.5 gigawatts of renewable capacity, renewable energy capacity across 21 countries. So that’s a very big deal. And Brazil is key here because Brazil represents the company’s first renewable energy project in South America. And all of this is important because Amazon is the world’s largest corporate purchaser of renewable energy across the globe. That really should not come as a surprise, right? Amazon has a very ambitious goal of reaching a hundred percent renewable energy across the whole of its business by 2025. Oh, hey, it’s 2022. That means that Amazon needs the ability to power their massive data centers, their fulfillment operations, their corporate offices across the globe, and really every part of their business.
And something I think that’s worth noting here is that by 2021, Amazon had already reached 85% renewable energy across its business. So it’s clear. What I love about this is that it’s clear that Amazon is not just talking the talk with partnerships with Water.org and with The Climate Pledge and all of that. Amazon is absolutely walking the walk as it relates to sustainability and renewable energy, and I think that’s really important. So how big is this news in terms of renewable energy? I think that in a word, it is huge. Once fully operational, Amazon’s global energy portfolio will generate 50,000 gigawatt hours of clean energy. The equivalent… And when you hear that, you’re like, “I don’t know what that means.” Right? Well, I’m going to tell you what it means. That’s the equivalent of the amount of electricity needed to power 4.6 million homes in the United States each year.
Lauren Kirkpatrick: Wow.
Shelly Kramer: That’s a lot.
Lauren Kirkpatrick: That is a lot.
Shelly Kramer: And last but not least on this front is probably also important to note that in order to help scale the benefits of its investments in renewables, Amazon is working with the Clean Energy Buyers Institute Beyond the Megawatt Initiative. And their work there, their partnership there is to ensure that the industry as a whole is maximizing the economic, the environmental, and the social impact of energy procurement. So not only is Amazon deploying these kind of initiatives, the company is setting a leading example by investing in renewables, investing in companies, developing clean energy solutions, sustainable supply chain, next-gen procurement tools, all of those things. So I thought that was really terrific news coming out of Climate Week 2022, and it’s hard to pick a favorite. Right?
Lauren Kirkpatrick: Absolutely.
Shelly Kramer: These are all great things.
