US CDN co Akamai to be 50% renewable by 2020

US content delivery network (CDN) services provider Akamai Technologies Inc (NASDAQ:AKAM) this week committed to sourcing renewable energy for 50% of its network operations by 2020 in order to reduce its absolute greenhouse gas emissions below 2015 levels.

In a blog post the company said that beyond sustainability, the business case was not so much about locking in fixed energy prices, but about anticipating the market trend with a growing number of its customers wanting clean-powered, low-carbon content delivery.

Akamai, whose network operations are highly-distributed globally, also said it wanted its investment to make an impact and add renewable energy to the grid. It has opted to act as the long-term energy "off-taker" at a fixed price for projects that will generate electricity similar to its annual energy usage in that power market. The electricity will be sold into the wholesale market, with the difference between the strike and market prices flowing to the company as a debit or credit, along with the credits for the renewable energy generated (RECs).

Akamai hopes that its procurement strategy could be a model for other companies with similar small-scale, distributed operations.

The company's network operations include hundreds of thousands of servers in more than 126 countries and thousands of locations. Its data centers are outsourced and each has small power needs. It does not own any facilities and pays the landlords for the electricity.

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