>"It’s good for the economy, good for business and good for our shareholders".
Let's be honest...it is not good for their shareholders. They are buying power at a significant premium and costing their shareholders money. It is a direct hit to the bottom line. This might be good for the environment - at the very least they are helping renewable energy companies get bank financing through purchase guarantees, which will advance the technologies being used and perhaps one day make them economically viable. But to say it's good for shareholders is disingenuous.
>"In some places, like Chile, Google said, renewables have at times become cheaper than fossil fuels."
I love all of the hedging that comes with any article that tries to paint renewables as economical. This sentence has holes a truck could drive through. It could literally mean that at one point, years ago, Chile had extremely high gas prices for a week and Google was amazed that their bill for that week was lower than it would have been with conventional power sources.
Unsubsidized wind power is driving nuclear power and coal out of business. Unsubsidized! Solar is still a bit more expensive, but will continue to decline in price each year.
Investing in solar on your roof, in most markets, in a better investment than the S&P500 (EDIT: Utility solar has costs approaching 2 cents/kwh and still declining). Google is doing their shareholders a service by hedging their energy costs, no different than when Delta (the airline) bought a refinery.
Google doesn't own these wind farms etc. They aren't investing in anything, and their shareholders aren't getting anything in return. They are paying a premium and hoping that the companies use the Google-provided profits/financing flexibility to advance the technology to the point where it will hopefully one day become economically viable. That day of course is not today, which is why I take issue with some of the statements in this article.
Ultimately, Google is doing a service for the world if in fact these companies use Google's support as intended. There are probably more effective, direct routes for a company of Google's size though - they could easily just roll out their own renewable energy research division, and then shareholders would own the resulting technologies. The approach that they are using doesn't seem logical to me, and then trying to spin it as if they are doing shareholders a favor by overpaying for power seems like they are making a bad mistake even worse.
Of course not. That'd be a pain in the ass. That's why they sign PPAs (power purchase agreements) that entitle them to the power from those generators (usually on 20-25 year contract terms). Think reserved instances at AWS. You're paying to commit to a resource usage. What does AWS do with that money? Buy hardware and provide the service to you. You simply make a payment.
> They aren't investing in anything, and their shareholders aren't getting anything in return.
There is value to signing a long term PPA that guarantees a set price of electricity for 10-20 years. For example, if Google powers a data center using wind power PPAs, they know exactly how much the electricity for the data center will cost over the life of those PPAs. If they power the data center with natural gas and coal-generated electricity bought through normal electricity markets, their electricity prices will change if the price of natural gas or coal change. Having more certainty into future operational costs is valuable because it allows you to make better informed decisions/investments. Plus, many wind power PPAs are being sold for less than the wholesale cost of electricity now, so they save that way too (recent PPAs signed in Texas are a great example).
There's negative value to them if those PPA's are overpriced relative to conventional power. This article seems to reluctantly admit that they are indeed overpaying in most markets most of the time. "We saved money that one time in Chile" isn't exactly a ringing endorsement of the economics of renewables at the present time.
Well, it all depends on the definition of good. Shareholders are people too, and for now, live on planet Earth and are thus affected by Google's energy usage. Also, from a economic perspective, the good can come from e.g. brand acceptance (and other indirect sources).
I'm guessing it really is good for shareholders in the simplest terms of dollars too; unsubsidized wind and solar electricity have only recently started to reach cost parity but with tax incentives the PPAs being signed really are less expensive than long term contracts for fossil electricity. So it's good for the environment and good for shareholders. (I'd be more sympathetic to complaints about the tax credits offered to renewable energy if we could go back to the beginning and eliminate all tax credits offered to fossil energy too, plus properly account for their externalities, but since that's going to happen when hell freezes over I'm fine with adding another layer of tax incentives for renewables.)
If Google believes that running off renewable energy will help protect their business in the future then this is good for shareholders. Shareholders care about the future value of stock, so if running off fossil fuels is deemed a business risk and this can mitigate that risk then it is good for the value of the stock.
Of course in the short term it might impact the bottom line but so long as the business trajectory is positive and Google's stock continues to be perceived as a good investment then that shouldn't matter.
And your issue with the line: "In some places, like Chile, Google said, renewables have at times become cheaper than fossil fuels."
Meh, it's PR, take it with a grain of salt and remember this isn't a peer reviewed paper.
"I love all of the hedging that comes with any article that tries to paint renewables as economical."
Generally all you have to do is account for all the costs. Just like dumping pollution into a river can seem economical from the point of view of the dumper, but not from the point of view of the people who live in the area.
The bit you quote is presumably going even further, and saying that even without taking into account the wider costs, it still makes economic sense in that narrow sense.
Every time I see this "doing anything green is bad for shareholders" meme, it involves an assumption that PR is worthless. If that's not what Google's leaders think, than the complainers should buy a different stock. Free market and all that.
Let's be honest...it is not good for their shareholders. They are buying power at a significant premium and costing their shareholders money. It is a direct hit to the bottom line. This might be good for the environment - at the very least they are helping renewable energy companies get bank financing through purchase guarantees, which will advance the technologies being used and perhaps one day make them economically viable. But to say it's good for shareholders is disingenuous.
>"In some places, like Chile, Google said, renewables have at times become cheaper than fossil fuels."
I love all of the hedging that comes with any article that tries to paint renewables as economical. This sentence has holes a truck could drive through. It could literally mean that at one point, years ago, Chile had extremely high gas prices for a week and Google was amazed that their bill for that week was lower than it would have been with conventional power sources.