When Google announced our plan to go beyond purchasing renewable power for 100% of our energy usage and operate on 24/7 carbon-free energy by 2030, we noted that achieving this goal will require new transaction structures, advancements in clean energy policy, and innovative new technologies. Today, we’re pleased to announce that one of these new technologies—a first-of-its-kind, next-generation geothermal project—will soon begin adding carbon-free energy to the electric grid that serves our data centers and infrastructure throughout Nevada, including our Cloud region in Las Vegas.  

Google and clean-energy startup Fervo have just signed the world’s first corporate agreement to develop a next-generation geothermal power project, which will provide an “always-on” carbon-free resource that can reduce our hourly reliance on fossil fuels. In 2022, Fervo will begin adding “firm” geothermal energy to the state’s electric grid system, where Google’s commitments already include one of the world’s largest corporate solar-plus-storage power purchase agreements. 

Importantly, this collaboration also sets the stage for next-generation geothermal to play a role as a firm and flexible carbon-free energy source that can increasingly replace carbon-emitting fossil fuels—especially when aided by policies that expand and improve electricity markets; incentivize deployment of innovative technologies; and increase investments in clean energy research, development, and demonstration (RD&D). 

Next-generation geothermal technology

Traditional geothermal already provides carbon-free baseload energy to a number of power grids. But because of cost and location constraints, it accounts for a very small percentage of global clean energy production. 

That’s one reason this new approach is so exciting; by using advanced drilling, fiber-optic sensing, and analytics techniques, next-generation geothermal can unlock an entirely new class of resource. And the US Department of Energy has found that with advancements in policy, technology, and procurement, geothermal energy could provide up to 120 GW of firm, flexible generation capacity in the US by 2050. 

As part of our agreement, Google is partnering with Fervo to develop AI and machine learning that could boost the productivity of next-generation geothermal and make it more effective at responding to demand, while also filling in the gaps left by variable renewable energy sources. Although this project is still in the early stages, it shows promise.

Using fiber-optic cables inside wells, Fervo can gather real-time data on flow, temperature, and performance of the geothermal resource. This data allows Fervo to identify precisely where the best resources exist, making it possible to control flow at various depths. Coupled with the AI and machine learning development outlined above, these capabilities can increase productivity and unlock flexible geothermal power in a range of new places. 

This won’t be the first time that Google is applying software solutions to clean energy applications: we’ve just announced an update to our carbon-intelligent computing program that helps us reduce emissions associated with running applications at Google data centers. And other forms of AI and machine learning are currently being used to increase the value of wind energy. 

Already this year, Google has taken significant strides toward sourcing 24/7 carbon-free energy for all our data centers, office campuses, and Cloud regions. On Earth Day, our CEO Sundar Pichai announced that for the first time, five of our global data center sites operated near or at 90% carbon-free energy in 2020. 

Not only does this Fervo project bring our data centers in Nevada closer to round-the-clock clean energy, but it also acts as a proof-of-concept to show how firm clean energy sources such as next-generation geothermal could eventually help replace carbon-emitting power sources around the world.

Google Cloud is proud to support our customers with the cleanest cloud in the industry. For the past four years, we’ve matched 100% of our electricity use with renewable energy purchases, and we were the first company of our size to commit going even further by running on carbon-free energy 24/7 by 2030.  As we work to achieve 24/7 carbon-free energy, we help you take immediate action to decarbonize your digital applications and infrastructure. We’re also working with our customers across every industry to develop new solutions for the unique climate change challenges that organizations face. Today, we’re excited to expand our portfolio of carbon-free solutions and announce new partnerships that will help every company build a more sustainable future. 

First, we’re launching Carbon Footprint, a new product that provides customers with the gross carbon emissions associated with their Google Cloud Platform usage. Now available to every GCP user for free in the Cloud Console, this tool helps you measure, track and report on the gross carbon emissions associated with the electricity of your cloud usage. Of course, the net operational emissions associated with your Google Cloud usage is still zero. With growing requirements for Environmental Social and Governance (ESG) reporting, companies are looking for ways to show their employees, boards and customers their progress against climate targets. Using Carbon Footprint, you have access to the gross energy related emissions data you need for internal carbon inventories and external carbon disclosures, with one click. 

Built in collaboration with customers like Atos, Etsy, HSBC, L’Oréal, Salesforce, Thoughtworks and Twitter, our Carbon Footprint reporting introduces a new standard of transparency to support you in meeting your climate goals. You can monitor your gross cloud emissions over time, by project, by product and by region, giving IT teams and developers metrics that can help them reduce their carbon footprint. Our detailed calculation methodology is published so that auditors and reporting teams can verify that their cloud emissions data meets GHG Protocol guidance.

“The power of knowledge combined with the power of technology innovation plays a vital role in proactively responding to the climate crisis we are facing. With Google Carbon Footprint reporting, Atos feeds emissions data in our Decarbonization Data Platform, demonstrating potential emissions reductions from the Google Cloud Platform to our customers. This reporting opens up new levels of emissions transparency, trajectory planning, and data insight to support our customers in meeting, and potentially accelerating towards, their climate goals.”—Nourdine Bihmane, Head of Decarbonization Business Line, Atos

“The capability to measure and understand the environmental footprint of our Public Cloud usage is among the key axis of our sustainable tech roadmap. With Google Cloud Carbon Footprint, we are now able to directly follow the impact of our sustainable infrastructure approach and architecture principles.”—Hervé DUMAS, Sustainability IT Director, L’Oreal

While digital infrastructure emissions are just one part of your environmental footprint, accurately accounting for IT carbon emissions is necessary to measure progress against the carbon reduction targets required to avert the worst consequences of climate change. To help you account for emissions beyond our cloud and across your organization, we’re excited to partner with Salesforce Sustainability Cloud, integrating our Google Cloud Platform emissions data into their carbon accounting platform. 

“As we face unprecedented climate challenges, companies across the globe need to embed sustainability into the core of their business in order to meet growing customer and stakeholder expectations, and reduce their environmental impact. Together, Google Cloud and Salesforce Sustainability Cloud can help our joint customers accelerate their path to Net Zero, leveraging data-driven insights and visualizations to track and reduce their carbon emissions to drive sustainable change.”—Ari Alexander, GM of Salesforce Sustainability Cloud. 

From information to action

With the gross energy-related emissions footprint of data associated with your Google Cloud usage now available, we’re committed to providing tools to not only measure your carbon footprint, but help you reduce it. We recently launched low-carbon region icons to help you choose cleaner regions to locate your Google Cloud resources. New users who see the icons are over 50% more likely to choose clean regions over others, ensuring their applications emit less carbon over time. 

For current Google Cloud users, we’re pleased to announce that Active Assist Recommender will include a new sustainability impact category, extending its original core pillars of cost, performance, security, and manageability. Starting with the Unattended Project Recommender, you’ll soon be able to estimate the gross carbon emissions you’ll save by removing your idle resources. Unattended Project Recommender uses machine learning to identify, with a high degree of confidence, projects that are likely abandoned based on API and networking activity, billing, usage of cloud services, and other signals, and provides actionable recommendations on how to remediate those abandoned projects. By deleting these projects, not only can you reduce costs and mitigate security risks, but you can also reduce your carbon emissions. In August, Active Assist analyzed the aggregate data from all customers across our platform, and over 600,000 gross kgCo2e was associated with projects that it recommended for cleanup or reclamation. If customers deleted these projects they would significantly reduce future gross carbon emissions. Check out this blog to learn more about Active Assist.

Solutions for climate resilience 

Many of our customers face difficult questions about how their business impacts the natural environment today, and how it will be affected by climate change in the future. Answering these questions requires rich datasets about the planet, better analytics tools and smarter models to predict potential outcomes. For over a decade Google Earth Engine has supported scientists and developers with hyperscale computing power and the world’s largest catalog of satellite image data. Today, we are delighted to announce the preview of Earth Engine as part of Google Cloud Platform. Now, you can access Earth Engine and combine it with other geospatial-enabled products like BigQuery. By extending Earth Engine’s powerful platform to enterprises through Google Cloud, we are bringing the best of Google together. 

Over the past year we’ve worked with a number of organizations to use Earth Engine technology with tools like BigQuery and the Cloud AI Platform to develop new solutions for responsible commodity sourcing, sustainable land management and carbon emissions reduction. Earth Engine enables companies to track, monitor and predict changes in the Earth’s surface due to extreme weather events or human-caused activities, thus  helping them save on operational costs, mitigate and better manage risks, and become more resilient to climate change threats. This new offering will wrap the unique data, insights and functionality of Earth Engine with a fully-managed, enterprise-grade experience and reliability.

As we work with our customers to accelerate their sustainability initiatives, earth observation data is proving critical to effectively plan for the long-term impacts of climate change. To extend our geospatial and sustainability use cases we’re also expanding our partnerships with CARTO, Climate Engine, Geotab, NGIS, and Planet to bring their data and core applications to Google Cloud.

These partners will each make their existing platforms and datasets available globally on Google Cloud, giving you low-latency and reliable access to critical data and applications that will inform your sustainability initiatives. By integrating water availability, agricultural data, weather risks, and extensive daily satellite imagery into Earth Engine and BigQuery, you can achieve more ambitious goals for the sustainability of your business and our planet.

Committing to help you meet your climate goals

With each of these tools, we’re working to reduce the barriers you face in adopting more sustainable technology practices. We understand that building more sustainable applications and infrastructure is not easy. You face competing priorities, technical challenges, and the perception that climate action is costly. 

It doesn’t have to be this way. Today, we are making a sustainability pledge to you: teams across Google Cloud are committing to eliminating the barriers you face in building a more sustainable digital future for your organization, and will help you take action today to realize your climate goals. We’ll do this in a number of ways: 

1. In digital transformation projects and workshops, sustainability teams will always have a seat at the planning table, so we can work together on using cloud technology to build a more sustainable future. 
2. We’re putting low-carbon signals natively into our products to help developers choose more sustainable options early in their application development. 
3. We’ll ensure carbon impact is measured consistently with other key performance indicators. Leveraging the social cost of carbon, the ROI models and value assessments you conduct with Google Cloud will project your emissions impact too. 
4. We’ll be transparent about our carbon impact, by publishing third-party reviewed reports and methodologies, so you can trust the data for your own reports and disclosures. 
5. We’ll continue to work with the industry on best practices, including educational resources like Sustainable IT – Decoded, a new masterclass created in partnership with Intel, that shares the expertise of sustainability thought leaders. 

For the next decade we need to work together to avert the worst consequences of climate change. We’ve made tremendous progress in building technology that helps everyone do more for the planet, and we’re excited to see what you do with it. Visit this page to learn more about Google Cloud’s sustainability efforts.

We are excited to announce that as of April 1, 2021, Google Cloud VMware Engine is covered under the Google Cloud Business Associate Agreement (BAA), meaning it has achieved HIPAA compliance. Healthcare organizations can now migrate and run their HIPAA-compliant VMware workloads in a fully compatible VMware Cloud Verified stack running natively in Google Cloud with Google Cloud VMware Engine, without changes or re-architecture to tools, processes, or applications.

Healthcare organizations increasingly use cloud platforms to personalize patient care, analyze large datasets more effectively, enhance research and development collaboration, and share medical knowledge. Leveraging cloud platforms can also help healthcare organizations increase the privacy and security of information systems, including protected health information (PHI), and, as a result, better comply with applicable laws and regulations while reducing the burden of compliance. For PHI, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) set standards in the United States to protect individually identifiable health information. HIPAA applies to health plans, most healthcare providers, and healthcare clearinghouses that manage PHI electronically, and to persons or entities that perform certain functions on their behalf. 

With Google Cloud, organizations can leverage solutions that enable secure, continuous patient care and data-driven clinical and operational decisions with ease, while being empowered with collaboration and productivity tools. Further, Google Cloud Platform supports HIPAA compliance. We offer HIPAA-regulated customers the same products at the same pricing that is available to all customers, unlike many other cloud providers. 

For healthcare organizations that leverage VMware on-premises, having a consistent, cloud-integrated platform that provides seamless access to native cloud services unlocks the opportunity to extend, migrate, and modernize healthcare IT infrastructure and applications in a fast, low-risk manner at their own pace. This is especially important for mission-critical healthcare provider workloads, where having a low-risk way to adopt the cloud is important. Google Cloud VMware Engine offers that solution. By achieving coverage under Google Cloud’s BAA, Google Cloud VMware Engine enables healthcare organizations to realize the benefits of cloud computing and stay on track with their HIPAA compliance efforts without additional complexity. This is very relevant in hybrid scenarios, where customers would like to leverage other native cloud services such as analytics and big data processing, without having to enter into multiple BAAs.

Google Cloud VMware Engine offers dedicated, isolated software-defined datacenter environments with fully redundant and dedicated 100 Gbps networking that are suitable for healthcare organizations to run applications storing and processing PHI data. Customers have the ability to encrypt their virtual storage area network (vSAN) using an external key management server. Healthcare customers can run their workloads in a native VMware environment—vSphere, vCenter, vSAN, NSX-T, and HCX—while benefiting from Google Cloud’s highly performant infrastructure to meet the needs of their workloads. Customers can connect their VMware applications to native Google Cloud services such as BigQuery and artificial intelligence (AI) to derive new insights from existing data and quickly make informed decisions. 

Protecting against and mitigating the impact of ransomware attacks is top-of-mind for Healthcare organizations. This requires building a cyber resilience program and back-up strategy to prepare for how users can restore core systems or assets affected by a security (in this case, ransomware) incident. This is a critical function for supporting recovery timelines and lessening the impact of a cyber event so organizations can get back to operating their business.  Google Cloud VMware Engine in combination with Google Cloud first party solutions such as Actifio Go, or partner solutions such as NetApp CVO can provide an efficient way to recover incremental point-in-time backups along with on-demand provisioning of new compute to  recover both data and infrastructure from Ransomware attacks quickly and efficiently. 

Healthcare customers can also use Google Cloud VMware Engine as a disaster recovery (DR) target for their on-premises VMware workloads. Healthcare organizations also need a business continuity plan for their mission critical applications. When a disaster occurs, hospitals need their data protected so they can quickly get back to treating patients. It is a HIPAA requirement that healthcare organizations must be able to recover from a natural disaster. Google Cloud VMware Engine offers a like-for-like cost-effective DR target for these customers. The DR environment can be operated without new training using the same tools as their on-premises deployment. Google Cloud VMware Engine is currently available in 12 regions across the globe including three regions in the US, which means our regional and multi-national customers can take advantage of this service for geographic diversification as well. 

If you are interested in understanding more and taking advantage of Google Cloud VMware Engine, contact your Google sales team now.

For details, see HIPAA compliance on Google Cloud Platform.