California’s historic Hearst cattle ranch is being used as a hybrid solar farm to provide power for Apple — partly thanks to Steve Jobs.
The Hearst ranch takes up 150,000 acres, split across two properties, on the border of San Luis Obispo County in central California. The land has been used for raising cattle since 1865, but are now also being used as the home of a 2,900-acre solar farm, which is providing energy to power the Apple Park campus.
“Steve Hearst knew Steve Jobs and provided valuable support,” Benoit Allehaut, director at Capital Dynamics, told CNBC. Capital Dynamics recently acquired this solar project from First Solar.
“Apple had the choice between multiple projects but selected California Flats to supply their power demand,” Allehaut continued. “First Solar used their panels and managed the construction.”
The project is still expanding. A second phase consisting of 2.5 million solar panels will reportedly be carried out this year. “Cowboys of Jack Ranch have been outnumbered by construction workers as the 280-megawatt solar project heads into its final month,” according to a Hearst press release.
The fully operational project will reportedly generate enough clean solar energy to serve the equivalent of 100,000 average homes per year, displacing more than 109,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) annually, based on the Pacific Gas and Electric grid.
Apple’s focus on sustainable energy continues to earn the company plaudits from organizations like Greenpeace, which last year rated Apple at 83 percent on its Clean Energy Index. That was significantly above the 8 percent scored by Oracle, the 11 percent scored by Samsung, the 17 percent scored by Amazon, the 56 percent scored by Google, and the 67 percent scored by Facebook.
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
One response to “Hearst family ranch provides solar power to Apple Park”
Why Apple has been good on its own energy needs as well as having a good effort in recycling returned products. Product obsolescence still is a big issue!
Lack of repairability and replaceable major components in their current laptop’s makes them a very wasteful company!
Being Green is more than ones own usage, it’s also the product life cycle, energy used to create the product, and lastly the raw material the product is made from and recovery of these raw materials.
The whole LiOn battery mess Apple is facing with the iPhone presently is a sign of the quality of the battery not able to even sustain better than 3 years of life.
I do commend Apple on pushing the envelope but not at the expense of usability. A cars life cycle under normal wear & tear is 8 – 10 years. A computer or cellphone should be as well. While the original owner may trade it in for something else the computer or cellphone could still be used by others who don’t need the newest technology. Just think of all of the schools which need computers here and in other countries. Repurposing in my mind is just as important as recycling!