Facebook is developing six solar plants to power its data centres.
In a Facebook post, CEO Mark Zuckerberg says: "For Earth Day, we're announcing six new solar projects to support Facebook data centres.
"Our data centres are already some of the most energy-efficient in the world, and last year we set a goal for all our data centres and offices to use 100% renewable energy by 2020. These new solar projects will help us reach that goal."
Earth Day is an annual event celebrated on 22 April with events held worldwide to demonstrate support for environmental protection. This year marked the 49th celebration of Earth Day, with the theme of "protect our species".
US-based utility Dominion Energy will add to its portfolio 350MW of solar assets in North Carolina and Virginia that will supply power for the social media giant.
The capacity will come from six projects, one of which was developed by Dominion Energy, while the other five have been or will be acquired from EDF Renewables, BayWa re Solar Projects and Strata Solar.
Dominion Energy said on Monday that the solar farms are located within its service area in the two states and will gradually become operational by the middle of 2020.
The company notes the collaboration with Facebook will support Dominion Energy's goal of having 3GW of solar and wind assets in operation or under development by 2022.
Dominion Energy notes the new projects will add 240MW of photovoltaic schemes in Virginia recently greenlit by the Virginia State Corporation Commission.
In August last year, Facebook said since its first purchase of wind power in 2013, it had signed contracts for over 3GW of new solar and wind energy, which includes over 2 500MW in just the past 12 months.
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