Google: How Google tapped Earth’s heat to power its data centres

Google, like other tech giants such as Apple, is working on operating the company’s data centres on 24/7 carbon-free energy by 2030. The company has started recycling materials in its products and it has now announced a new way it is using to harness energy and using it to power data centres.
Tapping geothermal energy
Google devised a method to use geothermal energy, or harness the consistent heat from within the Earth’s crust and generate electricity without burning fossil fuels or releasing carbon into the atmosphere.
“This helps provide a supply of clean energy that complements variable renewables, such as solar and wind, and brings the grid closer to operating on 24/7 CFE,” the company said.
For this, the company partnered with clean-energy startup Fervo two years ago. It is the world’s first corporate agreement to develop an enhanced geothermal power project, which is now operational and carbon-free electricity has started flowing onto the local grid that serves Google data centres in Nevada.
“Important step for our 24/7 carbon-free energy plans: geothermal power is now flowing into the grid that supports our Nevada data centres. Our project with @fervoenergy is the first of its kind globally, using new techniques to tap the heat of the earth,” Google CEO Sundar Pichai wrote in a post on X.

In a blog, Michael Terrell, senior director, energy and climate at Google explained that Fervo uses drilling techniques pioneered by the oil and gas industry to harness heat. Fervo dug two horizontal wells to tap into this subsurface heat at Google’s data centre site in Nevada.
The company also installed fiber-optic cables to capture data that shows the flow, temperature and performance of the geothermal system in real-time. The geothermal plant can produce round-the-clock CFE using less land than other clean energy sources, Google said.