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Apple Energy

Subsidiary that could grow into much bigger things

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Apple-backed trade association pledges support for energy storage legislation

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Apple has long been a supporter of renewable energy, pushing towards using alternative energy to power its worldwide operations. Now, an energy trade associate that includes Apple has expressed its support for a proposal from the U.S. energy regulator that would make it easer to participate in wholesale markets for energy storage and distributed energy resources…


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As Apple moves into the energy business, it gets approval to turn landfill gas into power

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While solar panels and wind turbines are the two best-known methods of generating renewable energy, they aren’t the only approaches. The day after we learned that Apple has become a power company, we hear that it has just been given the go-ahead to employ a particularly cool method.

Landfill gas utilization traps the methane gas given off from landfill sites and either converts it into pipeline-grade gas or uses it to generate electricity. It’s doubly environmentally friendly, generating power from waste but also preventing the release of methane – a greenhouse gas – into the atmosphere …


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Apple has just become an energy company, looks to sell excess electricity into the grid and maybe more

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Update: John Weaver did a deeper dive on this over at Electrek

Apple has quietly created an energy subsidiary, ‘Apple Energy’ LLC, registered in Delaware but run from its Cupertino headquarters. The company was seemingly formed to allow it to sell excess electricity generated by its solar farms in Cupertino and Nevada, with plans to sell electricity across the whole of the US.

[Apple Energy LLC] is a Delaware limited liability company and is a 100% wholly owned subsidiary of Apple Inc. [Contact is] Apple Energy LLC, One Infinite Loop, Cupertino, CA 95014

Given Apple’s expertise and huge commitment to using renewable energy to power its operations, it is no surprise that it wants to ensure that its solar farms generate sufficient power to meet its needs. Because the sun only shines during the day obviously, Apple needs to shift its generation and its usage. Data centers need to go 24/7. Apple Stores are open in the evening. Apple has alternatives for this at its campus (see Fuel Cell generation below) but if it wants to operate 100% renewable, it has to “trade” overcapacity during the middle of the day for “net-metered” energy during the evening or cloudy days.

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Apple’s Cupertino Campus 2 Photovoltaics are rated at 14 megawatts alone.

But a set of Federal Energy Regulatory Commission filings suggests that Apple could have bigger ambitions in the power field …


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