Fancy a burger with some renewable energy on the side?
Customers at fast-food giant McDonald’s might not know it, but that’s increasingly what they’re getting as they tuck in.
That's because the world’s largest restaurant chain is one of a growing number of corporations making the switch from fossil fuels.
In 2020, it signed a deal that will see it purchase 1.1 gigawatts (GW) of renewable energy from new US wind and solar projects, adding renewables capacity to the nation’s power grid in the process.
Having so far secured five such virtual power purchase agreements (PPAs), the company is on course to supply more renewable energy to the nation than most US companies and will also be half way towards hitting its science-based target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 36 per cent by 2030.1
McDonald’s is far from unique. In 2020 alone, more than 130 companies around the world agreed to buy renewable energy totalling 23.7 GW – or enough to power over 7 million homes annually – four times more than 2017 levels.2
Customers at fast-food giant McDonald’s might not know it, but that’s increasingly what they’re getting as they tuck in.
That's because the world’s largest restaurant chain is one of a growing number of corporations making the switch from fossil fuels.
In 2020, it signed a deal that will see it purchase 1.1 gigawatts (GW) of renewable energy from new US wind and solar projects, adding renewables capacity to the nation’s power grid in the process.
Having so far secured five such virtual power purchase agreements (PPAs), the company is on course to supply more renewable energy to the nation than most US companies and will also be half way towards hitting its science-based target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 36 per cent by 2030.1
McDonald’s is far from unique. In 2020 alone, more than 130 companies around the world agreed to buy renewable energy totalling 23.7 GW – or enough to power over 7 million homes annually – four times more than 2017 levels.2
There, they rose to 4.2GW in 2020 from just 300MW the previous year. Across the country, companies including Total and Anheuser Busch are orchestrating “cross-border virtual PPAs”, buying their clean energy there to offset fossil fuel use elsewhere in Europe.
PPAs are an increasingly popular way for companies to hit their emissions targets. So far, some 1,500 corporations worldwide – including multi-nationals such as Amazon, Apple and Ford – have joined the RE100 initiative, pledging to offset 100 per cent of their electricity consumption with clean energy. That's a big deal.
These firms’ economic output (total revenue of USD114 trillion) is the equivalent of half the US’s GDP while their 3.5 gigatonnes of greenhouse gas emissions are greater than the European Union’s annual total.3
According to Bloomberg New Energy Finance, if RE100 members were to meet their goals exclusively with PPAs, it would lead to an estimated 93GW of new, incremental solar and wind power. This is equivalent to almost 15 per cent of China’s total coal-fired fleet.
Retail giant Amazon has emerged as the largest corporate user of renewables with a total of 7.5 GW, and with its wind and solar PPA portfolios spanning from Australia and South Africa to Sweden and the UK. The company aims to power all its operations – from offices and fulfilment centres to data centres – with renewables by 2030, helping it hit its net-zero carbon target by 2040.
Zero carbon, 24x7
Corporate efforts to reduce carbon emissions with PPA are a step in the direction.But some companies feel they need to go even further in boosting their environmental credentials.
PPAs allow companies to access renewable energy at a fixed price without upfront capital. They also act as a hedge against future price volatility.
However, PPAs do not mean that energy generated from renewable sources and procured through PPAs, will directly power business operations. This is because each corporate facility is connected to its regional power grid just like any other electricity consumer. What's more, the power mix in each region usually includes a combination of renewable resources as well as carbon-based coal and natural gas.
To address this, US tech giant Google has a devised a novel fix. Having already achieved net-zero carbon as far back as 2007, it now wants to become carbon free by 2030.4
To do that, it plans to source enough carbon-free energy to match its electricity consumption in all its sites in any given hour for 365 days.
Take its data centre in Iowa for example. Although 74 per cent of the centre’s energy use was matched with carbon-free energy on an annual basis, the degree of matching fluctuated significantly due to the intermittent availability of wind.
During breezy days, Google-contracted local wind farms can produce nearly three times as much power as the data centre requires.
But on days when the wind hardly blows at all, the data centre is scarcely matched with carbon-free power and instead has a strongly carbon-based profile (see chart).
So to achieve round-the-clock carbon free energy match, the firm plans to increase its existing PPA arrangements and further boost energy efficiency.
Already, the average Google data centre uses half as much as a typical data centre. The company also plans to add to its energy storage capacity.
Meanwhile McDonald's, not satisfied with merely buying PPAs, has recently opened its new net zero restaurant in Orlando, Florida, where enough renewable energy is created on-site to cover all of its energy needs on a net annual basis.
Data and learning from the Disney Resort flagship, which has solar-panelled roof and CO2-absorbing breathable walls, will be used to help the chain reduce energy and water use elsewhere in its global operations – and provides food for thought for other companies in the industry.
[2] BNEF
[3] NewClimate Institute & Data-Driven EnviroLab (2020)
[4] Moving toward 24x7 carbon-free energy at Google data centers
Banner image: Kurushima-kaikyo-ohashi Bridges, from Mt. Kiro © Imabari District Sightseeing Association (Licensed under CC BY 4.0)
The night view of Iojima Bridge © roadsend1946 (Licensed under CC BY 4.0)
