Google Aims to Produce Cheap Renewable Energy

Google continues to invest in companies and research with the goal of producing renewable energy cheaper than coal, according to its "green energy czar." Google has touted its environmental consciousness, with CEO Eric Schmidt even pushing a national energy plan designed to cut the country’s greenhouse gas emissions nearly in half by 2030. Google is aiming to produce renewable energy cheaper than coal, both through its own research and by investing in outside companies, with the goal of having such a system operational within a few years. "In, you know, three years, we could have multiple megawatts of plants out there," Bill Weihl, green energy czar for Google, said in an interview with Reuters. "We’ll see whether we or us in combination with other people are prepared to fund much, much bigger facilities, or if we want to get a few more years’ experience before we really start to scale it up." Google has invested in advanced geothermal, wind and solar thermal; the latter involves concentrating solar energy via mirrors in order to power steam-turbines. Read the Full Article Here: http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Green-IT/Google-Aims-to-Produce-Cheap-Renewable-Energy-200218/