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Google is to Spider-Man as ... ?

Dennis Markatos-Soriano's take

In Spider-Man, Uncle Ben warns Peter Parker, "with great power comes great responsibility."

Google is one of the most profitable companies in the world with a market capitalization above $200 billion, and its founders and CEO are three of the richest people in the world. Add to that their leading position in the growing online ad and search markets, and they definitely qualify as having "great power." If Google follows through on its latest announcement to bring the price of renewables below that of coal then the spirit of Spider-Man will be alive and well.

Google.org, their philanthropic arm, plans to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to support research on solar thermal, wind, and other renewable technologies. And it doesn't look like greenwash to me because this act is consistent with other recent initiatives:

1. Google.org provided funding for a national student climate conference that brought more than 5,000 young people to D.C. in early November to strategize for clean energy revolutions on their campuses and push Congress to legislate an 80% cut in emissions by 2050.

2. Google is committed to be climate neutral by the end of the year, joining HSBC, Yahoo!, and others. Toward their goal, Google installed 1.6 MW of solar PV on their buildings this year, the largest corporate installation to date.

Is PR involved? Sure. But these moves can help steer energy markets in the right direction. Cheap, clean energy would be good for Google, and it's necessary for the health of the Earth.

Coal is arguably the key driver of global warming, as its carbon dioxide emissions per Btu of energy are 17% higher than those from oil and 44% higher than those from natural gas. And there are many other pollutants that hurt our air and water quality when we burn coal -- from the neurotoxin mercury to the sulfur dioxide that produces acid rain. Coal's abundance makes it the cheapest fossil fuel to rely on into the future, while the supply of oil is already at a plateau and natural gas may follow within a decade or two. This cheapness makes coal the fuel of choice for rapidly growing economies such as China, which probably passed the U.S. as the largest emitter nation of greenhouse gases this year. So, to prevent dangerous climate change, renewables have to not only be affordable to the richer countries of the world but also to developing countries.

Google picked a good time to focus on competing with coal. Its trading price is breaking records globally at more than $85 per metric ton and UBS predicted this week that continued demand growth in Asia will lift prices to further records above $100 in 2008 and 2009.

The twin challenges of skyrocketing energy prices and climate change can be tackled if Google's fell swoop is successful. But this is no easy task. Researchers have been developing wind turbines, solar panels, and biofuels for decades to achieve this goal, and while progress has been made, coal is still vastly cheaper. But if anyone can stand on the shoulders of millions of giants from the past and present, sort that information out, and produce a product that billions of people can enjoy — it's hard to argue that Google isn't a great candidate for the job.

I am hopeful that Google can help be like Spidey to achieve the sustainable energy transition our world needs.

PS: (I don't own Google stock, though I wish I did.)

Heidi Siegelbaum responds:

I can't think of one critical thing to say about Google's news - absolutely nothing!

Google is also stemming the tide against coal subsidies and may tip the balance in favor of renewable energy investments. On the policy side, lowering subsidies for coal would help: according to a recent GAO report, less than a fifth of federal energy R&D and tax expenditures go toward renewables, with the vast majority supporting fossil fuels and nuclear.

Google's detractors seem to believe that corporations operate in some vacuum... where have all the CSR flowers gone? There are more than 2,600 grantmaking (opens PDF) corporate foundations in the U.S., and inventive ones like Google are diversifying into new areas responsive to stakeholders' needs while wildly prospering. When did a corporation's foundation have to strictly mimic its lines of business?

A recently released report (opens PDF) on Corporate Design (or really, redesign) makes an interesting point that companies that have adaptive cultures and effectively serve the needs of their stakeholders outperform their peers on every count: growth in revenue, employment, stock price and net income. Google is serving its stakeholders by making this impressive investment in renewable energy. Who are a corporation's stakeholders? In this case, nearly every person attached to the fingers using a Google search function, the communities in which they operate their servers, Mountainview, CA, and all our children just to name a few. This is a solid piece of cerebral cortex with a soul, not solid image work.

Jim Nicolow responds:

This is a huge deal. If Google can successfully produce one gigawatt of renewable energy cheaper than coal it really will move the market. One gigawatt is equivalent to the output of a new coal power plant. To an architect accustomed to looking at renewable energy projects at the scale of individual buildings, measured in kilowatts (1/1,000,000 of a gigawatt), this is a significant undertaking by Google and worthy of praise.

Sure there's a PR angle to it. So what. With an informed populace, doing the right thing should make for good public relations. There is most certainly a business angle as well. The writing is on the wall. As Dennis points out, the price for fossil fuel energy continues to rise, while the price for renewable energy continues to fall. Those cost curves will cross. When a carbon tax or cap and trade system inevitably comes to the U.S., those cost curves could cross overnight, making renewable energy cheaper than coal from day one, as it should be.

But you don't need to be Google to support the transition to renewable energy. For instance, our practice partnered with Carbonfund.org this year to offset 100% of our electricity use and travel emissions.

Janne K. Flisrand responds:

Google's an old hand with green initiatives, and they aren't limited to giant PR activities.

On the corporate side, Google walks the sustainability talk as only a huge company can. They provide commuter buses to employees working in their Silicon Valley headquarters — with nearly one quarter of their workforce using them. Google builds its own energy-efficient servers. They installed the "largest single corporate solar installation in the world" to power their campus. Their campus food service serves healthy, organic food, and the chef at Cafe 150, one of their cafeterias, is a "passionate proponent of local, organic and sustainable food" using exclusively ingredients from within 150 miles. The Google Store stocks eco-gear. The list goes on.

Google employees are encouraged to work on their own projects, which often turn into public applications. A number of them have a green bent. There is Google Transit, which integrates the schedules and maps of different regional transit services. There's also a green map mash-up for vacation planners.

This culture pervades the company. Reading more about it, now I want to work for Google. Oh wait... maybe Google's HR has a hand in this...

• December 3, 2007 by Dennis Markatos
• 4 comments