Tech Companies Owe You an Answer

Relocating data centers and crypto mines to Oklahoma might be Big Tech’s best weapon for combating climate change.

What is this sorcery you’re speaking of, Robert?! Every one of Oklahoma’s 77 counties voted red in the past few elections! Oklahoma is not compatible with technology! I hope I predicated a little of your thought process there. Let’s dive in.

Photo of Oklahoma City by Raychel Sanner on Unsplash

Electricity Fuels by State

You might be surprised to learn that Oklahoma ranks #1 in the country for electricity consumption from Renewables. Renewables are defined herein as wind + solar, excluding hydroelectric and biomass.

44% of Oklahoma’s electricity came from Wind alone in 2019, yes greater than California and Texas.

We’ll give a nice shout out to Texas though and confirm that Texas ranks number one in the country for the most installed wind capacity of any state (and the worst football team known to man), which is different from how electricity is actually consumed.

Equally surprising, American tech would be the third-largest consumer of electricity in the world if it were a country. This implies that they are responsible for the fuels that fuel their empires (looking at you Google, Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon).

And it only gets worse when considering the electrical demand from mining cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, which has surpassed the electricity demand of Pakistan - a country with a population of 216 million people - in 2019.

Google & Amazon Web Services

AWS Worldwide Locations

Let’s take a second to appreciate what electricity looks like in the states where Google & AWS have decided to locate their data centers. The following list is sorted from the most expensive electricity to the least expensive, with some highlights about what kind of electricity is feeding their respective centers.

Values are reported in 2019 dollars per megawatt-hour (MWh), averaged among the residential, industrial, and commercial sectors:

#12 California at $165 per MWh (AWS):

• 23.49% renewables

• 1% coal,

it is worthwhile to note that CA imports tonnes of coal generation from Nevada, and are facing electricity stability issues.

#11 Alabama at $100 per MWh (Google):

• 0.28% renewables

• 19.31% coal

#10 Iowa at $100 per MWh (AWS):

• 42.23% renewables

• 35.26% coal

#9 South Carolina at $97 per MWh (Google):

• 0.80% renewables

• 15.04% coal

#8 Ohio at $93 per MWh (AWS)

• 1.73% renewables

• 39.91% coal

#7 Tennessee at $90 per MWh (Google):

• 0.46% renewables

• 23.01% coal

#6 Virginia at $90 per MWh (AWS)

• 0.90% renewables

• 3.69% coal

#5 Georgia at $90 per MWh (Google):

• 1.69% renewables

• 20.58% natural gas

#4 North Carolina at $89 per MWh (Google):

• 6.09% renewables

• 23.93% coal

#3 Nevada at $87 per MWh (Google):

• 13.54% renewables

• 7.61% of coal

#2 Oregon at $87 per MWh (AWS)

• 12.84% renewables

• 4.21% coal

#1 Oklahoma at $76 per MWh (Google):

• 34.69% wind

• 09.40% coal

Oklahoma is even more remarkable when you consider that Oklahoma does not even consume all of its wind generation each year, leaving more consumption on the vine from existing wind farms. Google clearly appreciates Oklahoma as the home of the cleanest and cheapest electrons that North America has to offer, as evidenced by the fact that their second-largest worldwide facility is located in my backyard.

It should be noted that Google has planned a data center in DENMARK as well, the country with the absolute highest electricity prices in the world at over $300 per MWh, and a country deriving only 4.32% of its total consumption in a year from renewables (source: BP Statistical review 2020).

Like Google and Amazon, tech companies owe their stakeholders an answer. If they are serious about deep decarbonization, how do they not consolidate their electricity-intensive operations to Oklahoma? Tesla took a hard look at Oklahoma recently. You should too.

The simple fact of the matter is this — Oklahoma (not California or Texas) provides the most inexpensive ethically sourced and cleanest electrons the world has to offer!

This article was updated on June 16, 2021 to include more relevant and updated electricity price information.