Google’s largest clean energy project is located 40 miles north of XAI’s unlicensed gas power plant

Google He said It has made its largest solar and battery storage purchase to date. The first two phases of the project, located in Arkansas, will generate enough electricity to power about 6% of the state’s needs. peak demandThe company said earlier this week.

Electricity from the project will flow directly into the grid, offsetting demand from Google’s data centers. Google is investing in the project alongside developer Cypress Creek Energy and is purchasing the entire output of the first two phases, adding 1 gigawatt of solar and 1.9 gigawatt-hours of battery storage to its portfolio.

When completed, the three-phase project will be the largest solar facility in the United States, the companies said. The third and final phase of the project is scheduled to be connected to the grid in 2029, bringing the station’s total capacity to about 1.8 gigawatts of solar energy and 2.9 gigawatt-hours of battery storage. Cypress Creek has secured $3.5 billion in financing to support the first two phases.

The Steele River Energy Center, as the project is called, will be located about 30 miles north of Memphis, Tennessee. By connecting solar panels to large batteries, the power plant will be able to supply power to the grid all day, every day. It will also help Google in its quest to match electricity use with clean energy on an hourly basis, an aggressive measure that will help bring more hybrid power plants onto the grid.

Google’s decision to invest in a large solar and battery facility stands in contrast to XAI, which operates… The natural gas power plant is not licensed About 40 miles to the south.

Elon Musk has invested heavily in natural gas to power xAI’s Colossus data centers, despite running Tesla, which makes grid-scale solar panels and batteries. XAI operates nearly 60 natural gas turbines without obtaining federal clean air permits, according to A a report From Reuters. Reuters found that pollution from XAI’s power plant in Mississippi is affecting predominantly black neighborhoods.

Musk is unlikely to change course. It is recently Bought APR Energya project developer specializing in natural gas power plants.

Google has also invested in natural gas, Working with Crusoe to build a 933-megawatt power plant in West Texas, although that project was an anomaly for the company, which had relied mostly on clean energy to expand its portfolio. And given the speed at which projects like Steel River can be deployed — nearly 2 gigawatts of solar power in three years — it’s likely that Google will continue to invest in renewables and batteries.