Pictured is a rooftop solar system installed at Amazon’s fulfillment warehouse in Avenel, New Jersey. The company met a goal to install solar at 50 of its distribution centers worldwide. With on-site arrays alone, Amazon has approximately 11,700 modules at its warehouses. P2 Photography
Amazon today announced 37 new renewable energy projects around the world, marking significant progress on its path to power 100% of its operations with renewable energy by 2025 — five years ahead of the original target of 2030. The projects will supply clean energy for Amazon’s operations, including its corporate offices, fulfillment centers and Amazon Web Services (AWS) data centers that support millions of customers globally.
Of these 37 projects, 23 are in the United States. This brings Amazon’s total clean energy procurement in the U.S. from 7.2 GW to 10.4 GW. Notably, the new projects include Amazon’s largest renewable energy project (by capacity) announced to date, which is a 500-MW solar farm in Texas. The announcement also includes the company’s first renewable energy projects in Missouri. The remaining projects are in Arizona, Arkansas, California, Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Mississippi, Ohio, Oklahoma and Virginia.
The new global projects increase the capacity of Amazon’s renewable energy portfolio by nearly 30%, from 12.2 GW to 15.7 GW, and bring the total number of renewable energy projects to 310 across 19 countries. The additional 3.5 GW of clean energy capacity from these new projects extends Amazon’s leadership position as the world’s largest corporate buyer of renewable energy, and advances its efforts to meet The Climate Pledge, a commitment to be net-zero carbon by 2040 — 10 years ahead of the Paris Agreement. To see Amazon’s renewable energy projects around the world, visit the company’s renewable energy project interactive map.
“Our commitment to protecting the planet and limiting Amazon’s impact on the environment has led us to become the largest corporate buyer of renewable energy in the world in both 2020 and 2021. Given the growth of our business, and our mission to run 100% of Amazon’s operations on renewable energy, we aren’t slowing our renewable investments down,” said Andy Jassy, CEO of Amazon. “We now have 310 wind and solar projects across 19 countries, and are working hard to reach our goal of powering 100% of our business on renewable energy by 2025 — five years ahead of our original target of 2030.”
Amazon also continues to invest in renewable energy projects paired with energy storage. The energy storage systems allow Amazon to store clean energy produced by its solar projects and deploy it when solar energy is not available, such as in the evening hours, or during periods of high demand. This strengthens the climate impact of Amazon’s clean energy portfolio by enabling carbon-free electricity throughout more parts of the day. The new projects include a 300-MW solar project paired with 150 MW of battery storage in Arizona and a 150-MW solar project paired with 75 MW of battery storage in California. Combined, the two projects double Amazon’s total announced solar paired with energy storage from 220 MW to 445 MW.
“Amazon continues to be a leader in rapidly scaling up renewable energy projects here in the U.S. This increasingly includes hybrid projects that pair energy storage with renewable energy generation, unlocking the ability to use clean reliable energy throughout all hours of the day,” said Heather Zichal CEO of the American Clean Power Association (ACP).
News item from Amazon
Batteries store MWh not MW. When describing batter storage its ability to deliver power would be in MW and its capacity is in MWh. Describing battery storage as 150MW tells us nothing useful about the battery.