Apple and Amazon are now among the top 10 corporate (onsite) solar energy producers in the U.S., according to a new report Thursday from the Solar Energy Industry Association. Overall, corporate America, including some tech giants, is increasingly turning to solar energy not only for its eco-friendliness, but also to save money (prices have fallen 52% in the past five years).
Apple now ranks No. 4, recently announcing that, through its energy projects and power acquisition agreements, the amount of “green” energy the company is putting on the grid now exceeds the amount of “brown” (fossil fuel) energy it uses. Apple has a large solar installation on the roof of its new Apple Park facility in Cupertino, California.
The SEIA says Apple’s onsite (as in, installed on top of company buildings) solar installations together create 79 megawatts of power. Apple’s solar panels produce enough electricity annually to fully charge more than 44 million iPhones every day for a year, the group told Fast Company.
Amazon moved to No. 10 on the list after building several major green power installations last year, with a total onsite solar output of at least 17.5 megawatts. Amazon wasn’t even in the Top 25 last year. The company’s solar installations generate enough electricity to power more than 1.4 million Echo Dots every year, says the SEIA, helpfully.
U.S. companies together built 3 gigawatts of onsite and off-site solar installations last year–a record–GTM Research has reported. Here’s where the biggest ones are:
Other highlights . . .
Target and Walmart top the SEIA list (again) with 205 megawatts and 149 megawatts of solar installed, respectively.
The SEIA’s report contains data from over 4,000 companies, totaling more than 2.5 gigawatts of solar capacity across approximately 7,400 solar projects.
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