Jun 10, 2011

Google's Green Push Is Like Taking 2,000 Cars Off the Road Each Year

From their data facility cooled by seawater, to the green-friendly architects they hired to design their new offices, we here at Techland are big fans of all the sustainable initiatives Google's been unveiling.

In the latest post on the Google blog, the company revisits its RechargeIT initiative from 2007, which aimed to cut CO2 levels and oil use by standardizing electric plug-in vehicles across the company.

Their goal was to build a company culture that would help speed up the commercial adoption of electric vehicles, and hopefully show that green-friendly transportation didn't only work, but that it's a viable way to do business.

Rolf Schreiber, Google's Technical Program Manager of Electric Transportation, states that passenger vehicles make of 1/2 of the greenhouse gas emissions every year, which, if we don't begin cutting back, could make this week's record setting temperatures feel cool in comparison.

But now with a "Gfleet" line of electric vehicles such as the Nissan LEAF and Chevy Volt, plus clean biodiesel shuttles and over 230 electric charging stations for employee use, the company claims to have an annual net carbon savings of 5,400 tonnes, or the equivalent of shaving off 14 million vehicle miles per year.

Almost as cool as the Les Paul doodle from yesterday. Almost.

Source: techland.time.com