John Paczkowski

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Google’s Latest Mission: Organize the World’s Electricity

February 19, 2010 at 2:04 pm PT

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ec_google Google has won approval to enter the speculative energy trading business. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission issued an order Thursday giving the company the authority to buy and sell wholesale electricity just like a utility.

Presumably, Google (GOOG) will use it to keep energy costs down by hedging power consumption against market movements. But as I’ve noted here before, the authorization also gives Google the ability to “act as a power marketer, purchasing electricity and reselling it to wholesale customers.” And the company has established a subsidiary called Google Energy. But Google insists its ambitions don’t extend beyond its own energy needs. As spokesperson Niki Fenwick told me in January, “[this] does not signal our intent to operate as a retail provider of electricity.”

I suppose not. After all, while Google doesn’t operate any power generation or transmission facilities. Well, not yet, anyway.

Tagged with: authorization, digital, electricity, energy costs, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Google, Google Energy, hedge, innovation, Internet, John Paczkowski, market, Niki Fenwick, power consumption, power marketer, reselling, retail provider, search, subsidiary, wholesale

comments so far. Add yours.

  • http://blog.macb.net macbeach

    I wonder if there is some strange way to sign up for “Google Power and Light” and have it all paid for by advertising?

    Where do I sign?

  • kishorus

    is there any particular reason u keep typing things like GOOG after google or EBAY eBay? please resist the urge – it hurts my eye.

  • http://blog.macb.net macbeach

    Very common for tech (or finance) publications to mention ticker symbols after company references. I can't believe you have never seen that before. Why do you type “u” for “you” or fail to use capital letters to start your sentences? I find that equally annoying. Maybe we should both be more tolerant.

  • JohnDoey

    Excellent headline.

  • montyveda

    They dominated online search, they bought YouTube, therefore dominating online video, they created googlemail, launched a phone, then google buzz and are soon to launch their operating system… so that's ITcomms pretty much covered. It doesn't surprise me that google are noe moving into the energy supply market, although they currently claim to be only interested in their own supply. How long before they change their name to SkyNet? Just after they launch their defense system and android??

  • http://www.wholesalepages.co.uk Wholesale Suppliers

    They can do it I think they are the largest organization and company in the whole world so they have the capability also to manage Wholesale Trade Energy

  • http://www.wholesalepages.co.uk Wholesale Suppliers

    They can do it I think they are the largest organization and company in the whole world so they have the capability also to manage Wholesale Trade Energy and can easily left behind ebay and amazon but I think amazon will give them bit difficult time