Solar Energy ArticlesFacebook Data Center - Installation of Solar Panels In this article, we are going to have a look at the installation of the solar panels on to the new data center of the social networking giant Facebook. Facebook installed the solar panels in the form of large arrays of the solar cells in its data center in Oregon. This will make a provision of providing the electricity to the 300000 square foot facility. This is a reply generated by Facebook owing to the bashing it has got from the environmental agencies, the prime of them being the Greenpeace International. The bashing is due to the "dirty coal" power (electricity) that Facebook puts to use in its Oregon center. The 100kW solar array that Facebook is planning to install facilitates the use of solar power to its resources in that particular data center. The above described project initiated by Facebook makes it eligible to be one of the very few companies of the world in order to install the solar panel arrays to power its resources on such a mass scale. This also makes it liable for Facebook to the complexity subjected by the power sourcing which is to be done when the project is in the production stage. This is the representation of Facebook to the solar energy on a huge scale. However, there is a problem faced by Facebook in this regards. The 100kW project is not going to supply too much of a power to the resources that are already installed at the solar panel installation site. Hence it can be stated that the project that Facebook is planning to implement is going to supply only enough power to source the office areas and also the mechanical rooms. Facebook has not yet revealed as to hum much power consumption takes on a periodical basis in the datacenter. However, owing to the size and the nature of resources present in the data center, it can be very well stated that Facebook is going to measure electricity consumption in dozens of Megawatts of electricity. It takes 7 acres of land where the solar panels must be installed so that only one Megawatt of power is generated into electricity. And as it is, Facebook is not going to power its power centric server rooms. The organization Greenpeace international was harsh on the business of Facebook in the Oregon datacenter because the local power comes by burning thousands of tons of coal. This is an utter waste of resources of non-renewable form owing to the amount of electricity consumption carried out by Facebook per day. Facebook has not yet taken seriously the repeated warnings generated by the environmental bodies owing to the lesser amount of efficiency at the Oregon center. And to add to the worries, Facebook is expanding as ever, making it a challenge for the social networking giant to sustain growth suitably in terms of power requirements. Facebook also needs to commit itself to the green energy sources so that the pressure it puts on the non-renewable sources of energy is eased out. The restrictions posed by the environmental concerns demanded that Facebook should be dependent on Pacific power to a much lesser extent that the current scenario. Hence in a press release, Facebook announced its plans to succumb to these demands and spend money or rather invest in much cleaner source of energy. The power usage effectiveness (PUE) of the datacenter in concern is 1.07. This makes it one of the leading companies in the industry to make use of the power to a great extent of efficiency. The authorities at Facebook expressed concern over the environmental issues and also stated that Facebook is emphasizing on "negawatt" for deriving their power. Thus Facebook is making attempts from its size to resort to the energy conservation. Related articles
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