Apple inked separate power purchase agreements with a wind power project in Gilliam County that will begin construction in September and with Oregon’s soon-to-be largest solar power plant, which is underway in Crook County. The tech giant revealed its plans in its latest Environmental Responsibility Report.
An Oregon program called Direct Access allows commercial customers to opt out of Portland General Electric and Pacific Power service and buy power from other electricity service suppliers. Apple is taking advantage of that program.
The 202 MW wind power plant, developed by Avangrid Renewables, will be the first phase of the 404 MW Montague Wind Power Project. The development will eventually have as many as 269 wind turbines with turbine sizes up to 3 MW.
The solar plant is Gala Solar, under construction in Prineville, where Apple has a data center. SunPower Corp. started construction on the 56 MW plant in February, with completion slated by the end of this year. The plant is cutting-edge: It will include high-efficiency SunPower E-Series panels installed on SunPower Oasis trackers, which will enable more megawatt hours per acre to be generated compared to conventional solar technology.
There are two Apple data centers in Prineville, with a third underway. According to the company, the site used 115,000 MW hours of electricity in 2016, roughly double compared with the year before.
