Google is at it again, we’ve covered Google quite a bit, more than any other company I think. It’s just so nice to see a company with billions of dollars at their disposal directing their energy at improving the world (and yes, I know that Google is nowhere near perfect and Sun is more the environmentally friendly tech company).
This time around they are contuning their solar power drive by investing in companies that will encourage the use of renewable energy. They emphasize solar power, but they are not limiting the hundreds of millions of dollars they want to invest in solar power.
“Our goal is to produce one gigawatt of renewable energy capacity that is cheaper than coal. We are optimistic this can be done in years, not decades,” Larry Page, Google’s co-founder and president of products, said in a statement.
One gigawatt can power a city the size of San Francisco.
Google is seeking to capitalize on the recent excitement among Silicon Valley entrepreneurs to apply the risk taking that computer, biotech and Internet businesses are famous for to the field of alternative energy production.
Google’s latest moves come as the price of a barrel of oil nears $100 and coal, which produces 40 percent of the world’s electricity, faces regulatory and environmental pressures that could drive up prices.
If Google is right that a renewable technology that is cheaper than coal is ‘years, not decades’ away, the interesting thing is that it takes a huge slug of quasi-charitable capital to research it. No fully commercial investor seems to believe the case sufficiently to put their money where there mouth is.
Yeah, sometimes it takes people who see good in just doing something for no direct benefit to lead the way for the rest of us.
Interestingly, I read somewhere that Google’s spending might be bigger than the US governments.
Google, save our country from the oil barons!