• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer @lauriesullivan, August 3, 2010

Search for Greenpeace International on Facebook and you'll find a Fan page protesting the social network's use of coal power, along with about 477,000 Greenpeace friends who would rather see Facebook power its new data storage facility with renewable sources.

Facebook is building a server farm in Prineville, Ore., to support its 500 million members. The company plans to use some of the most sophisticated technologies to run the data center and expects it will employee between 150 and 200 construction workers to complete the 307,000-ft facility by 2011. It also will create 35 long-term jobs.

The center will use 30 MW of electricity, enough to power 30,000 homes, to support Facebook's 500 million members. Facebook says the environmentally friendly facility will have all the latest technology, but evidently Greenpeace doesn't see it that way. The biggest problem: The region's utility server, Pacificorp, gets 58% of its power from coal plants in Wyoming and Utah, which is higher than the national average.

Greenpeace, however, wants the social network to commit to 100% renewable energy and set up guidelines on its Fan page to lead the company toward cleaner burning energy. The group requests that Facebook commit to use its purchasing power to choose only clean, renewable sources of electricity; advocate for strong climate and energy policy changes at all levels to ensure that as the IT industry's energy demand increases, so does the supply of renewable energy; and share the information publicly on its Web site, so its millions of members know the company leads in environmental client issues.

Mark Zuckerberg should be plugged into the twenty first century and Gen Y, sensitive and empathic, but he's not, according to Len Stein, founder of Visibility, a marketing public relations specialist. "He's like Bill Gates, because he's not a marketer, but rather a codie and a geek," Stein says.

As Facebook continues to grow, the social network needs to look toward Google for leadership, according to Stein. "If Google can go green, than the rest of the industry needs to take a hard look at following the leader or risk these kinds of consumer advocate groups marshaling the forces of their own technology against them," Stein says. "Why shouldn't Greenpeace just throw it in their face?"

Stein says Facebook needs to "listen to the conversation."

Some company execs don't listen or communicate corporate strategies in a language consumers understand. We witnessed that in Facebook's privacy debacle that landed its execs squarely in the middle of multiple lawsuits and government hearings.

Google, which supports search through huge server parks that had been known to emit carbon, had a challenging time convincing environmentally conscious consumers it's a good idea to stick with purchasing carbon offsets as part of a portfolio of renewable energy and efficiency improvements. Carbon offsets are credits canceling out the purchaser's greenhouse gas emissions by triggering actions and projects that prevent pollution. So, Google went with wind power. In July, Google SVP of Operations Urs Hoelzle explained in a blog post the search engine acknowledges its reliance on "large quantities of electricity to power Google services" and plans to take action to support renewable energy.

A 20-year green Power Purchase Agreement will allow Google to move more toward renewable resources to power its server farm, and on July 30 it begin purchasing clean energy from 114 megawatts of wind generation at the NextEra Energy Resources Story County II facility in Iowa at a predetermined rate for 20 years.

Incorporating large amounts of wind power wasn't easy, Hoelzle explains, but the system produces enough power to supply several data centers, and it's more meaningful than buying renewable energy credits, according to Google.