Amazon has invested in its own renewable energy projects following Eskom’s latest loadshedding warning.
Amazon has announced it will generate its own electricity in South Africa through solar and wind projects to supply its data centres. This follows Eskom’s warning of a high probability of loadshedding due to severely constrained power systems.
Amazon said it had launched 26 new utility-scale wind and solar energy projects totalling 3.4 gigawatts (GW) of electricity production capacity, bringing its total investment in renewable energy in 2020 to 35 projects and more than 4GW of capacity. The 26 new wind and solar projects are located in Australia, France, Germany, Italy, South Africa, Sweden, the UK, and the US.
Amazonhas invested in 6.5GW of wind and solar projects that will enable the company to supply its operations with more than 18 million megawatt hours (MWh) of renewable energy annually. These projects will supply renewable energy for Amazon’s corporate offices, fulfilment centres, and Amazon Web Services (AWS) data centres.
Part of that commitment is powering Amazon’s infrastructure with 100 percent renewable energy, and the company is now on a path to achieve this milestone by 2025, five years ahead of the initial 2030 target. “Amazon is helping fight climate change by moving quickly to power our businesses with renewable energy,” said CEO Jeff Bezos.
