Iron Mountain Announces the Largest Rooftop Solar Installation of Any Data Center in the US
New 7.2MW solar installation will generate 15 percent of the Edison, New Jersey data center’s current electricity load
BOSTON : Iron Mountain Incorporated® (NYSE: IRM), the storage and information management company, announced today that they have closed on their largest on-site solar power-purchase agreement (PPA) contract to date. The 7.2 MW-rated solar installation at Iron Mountain’s data center in Edison, New Jersey (NJE-1) is forecast to generate more than 9 Million KWhrs per year, which is enough electricity to power more than 1,000 homes for a year. The solar installation will provide approximately 15 percent of the data center’s current energy load.
Developed in collaboration with a subsidiary of NextEra Energy Resources, a leading clean energy company with approximately 21,000 MW of net generating capacity, and Black Bear Energy, which facilitated the project acting as the owner’s representative to Iron Mountain, the project is slated for completion at the end of 2019. It will be the largest rooftop solar installation of any data center in the USA.
“The on-site solar Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) will be added to a portfolio of renewable energy contracts that already cover 100 percent of Iron Mountain’s worldwide data center operations,” said Kevin Hagen, Vice President Environment, Social & Governance (ESG) Strategy at Iron Mountain. “It’s part of Iron Mountain’s mission to obtain local, reliable, cost effective, 24/7 renewable energy solutions to meet the company’s RE100 goal of 100 percent renewable electricity for global operations.”
In collaboration with Renewable Energy Buyers Alliance (REBA) and Business for Social Responsibility (BSR), Iron Mountain participated in the Future of Internet Power (FoIP) effort to develop an industry supported open source protocol that enables data center customers to claim the benefits of renewable energy contracts. Iron Mountain’s Green Power Pass, launched in February of this year, is the first generally available solution for the data center industry that meets the full transparency and auditability requirements of the FoIP protocol.
Green Power Pass enables Iron Mountain data center customers to report carbon emission reductions associated with the green power consumed at any Iron Mountain data center worldwide. Early adopters of the Green Power Pass include Akamai, WeWork and Arizona State University.
“This is a great example of data center industry leaders working together to use their market influence and purchasing power in ways that encourage cost effective, renewable energy options for everyone,” said Hagen. “Renewable energy can now be delivered at or below grid costs and often with the added benefit of long-term stable pricing, making solar and wind not only the more sustainable option, but also the more economically attractive choice.”
“Akamai has developed a state-of-the-art, energy-efficient data center to support our New York tri-state platform operations,” said Mike Mattera, director, corporate sustainability at Akamai Technologies, Inc. “Iron Mountain’s Green Power Pass was a valuable part of that deployment. With Iron Mountain’s rooftop solar installation, the partnership now aides our renewable strategy on a more local level.”
The Edison data center building was once a printing press for the New York Times. Today, it stands as a cutting-edge example of sustainability and innovation.
“We are honored to have been selected to partner with Iron Mountain to help them meet their renewable energy goals,” said Matt Ulman, executive director of distributed generation for NextEra Energy Resources. “Iron Mountain is a model of how solar energy can help companies achieve their sustainability goals while creating significant savings. This landmark project is fully developed and in construction, and we’re looking forward to seeing it commissioned and operating.”
“This project has positive planetary and financial impact and will continue to deliver for two decades to come,” said Drew Torbin, CEO, Black Bear Energy. “We are energized to work with such a leading company like Iron Mountain.”
Iron Mountain’s Edison, New Jersey data center is one of 14 operational facilities across 13 markets and three continents. Including leasable capacity and land and buildings held for future development, Iron Mountain’s data center platform can support more than 350 megawatts of IT capacity at full build-out. For more information on Iron Mountain Data Centers.
About Iron Mountain
Iron Mountain Incorporated (NYSE: IRM), founded in 1951, is the global leader for storage and information management services. Trusted by more than 225,000 organizations around the world, and with a real estate network of more than 90 million square feet across more than 1,450 facilities in over 50 countries, Iron Mountain stores and protects billions of valued assets, including critical business information, highly sensitive data, and cultural and historical artifacts. Providing solutions that include information management, digital transformation, secure storage, secure destruction, as well as data centers, cloud services and art storage and logistics, Iron Mountain helps customers lower cost and risk, comply with regulations, recover from disaster, and enable a digital way of working. Visit http://www.ironmountain.com for more information.
About Black Bear Energy Inc.
Black Bear Energy is a technology-enabled energy services company that represents commercial renewable and clean energy buyers. Black Bear represents over 55 clients who in aggregate own, manage, or control more than 4 billion square feet of real estate through the U.S.
SOURCE Iron Mountain Incorporated
