Thiele: Coal vs. Green Complicated by Incentives

Is scrutiny of data centers' low adoption of renewable energy fair? Or are data center operators being blamed for a U.S. energy system in which few key players are properly incentivized for a broad-based shift to renewable power?

Mark Thiele at Data Center Pulse tackles these questions in a blog post titled Cloud Computing and Huge Data Centers Are Killing Our Planet! Not really, of course. Although he has some sport with the headline-grabbing alarmism, Thiele addresses some key points about the complexity of data center energy sourcing.

"What I always find missing in these stories criticizing large data centers and cloud computing is a comparison of the alternatives and a fair assessment of market and political drivers affecting data center build decisions," Mark writes."If you put free Twinkies in front of someone with limited funds, but charge them $20 for a similar amount of Broccoli, which one will the person pick to eat? In other words, why would a company pay 15 cents a kilo Watt hour for clean energy, when federal and state governments are using taxpayer funds to practically give away fossil fuel generated energy? Our Federal government continues to subsidize the coal and fossil fuel industry to the tune of billions of dollars every year."

Mark has much more to say on the issue. Read the full post at Data Center Pulse.