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Google Gets US Approval To Buy and Sell Energy
An anonymous reader writes "The US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on Thursday granted Google the authority to buy and sell energy on a wholesale basis. Google applied for the authorization last December through a wholly owned subsidiary called Google Energy. 'We made this filing so we can have more flexibility in procuring power for Google's own operations, including our data centers,' Google spokeswoman Niki Fenwick said via e-mail. But the authorization also raises the prospect that Google may start to buy and sell energy as a business." Reader angry_tapir supplies a link to the approval document itself (PDF).
Google Enron!
Does this mean we can attach energy to our emails now?
All the power to you!
You're working on fiber to the home.
Now you're working on Power.
Perhaps someday soon your name will appear on my utility bills as well.
So-far everything is good. But I'm afraid.
You control my email, you control my web searches, you pay me for ads on my site.
You say don't be evil. And I believe you.
But I'm still afraid. ...
I'm afraid that if I will ever wrong you,
if you're ever displeased with what I say about you,
I will dissapp#~s8 -`15ht@#&fge LOST CARRIER
Presumably Google have found a way to tag each electron with targetted advertising.
Plug your washing machine into a Google Energy supply and your shirts will come out of the machine covered in ad-words suggestions.
I hate to think what you'll get adverts for when you wash a three day old pair of gruds.
Welcome to Google *Earth*
For those of you wondering when Google will become sentient:
I think this proves it already is and is just solidifying its control over the systems it needs to dominate the world!
Next will be when Google becomes a defense contractor specializing in nuclear weapons security.
Poor Larry Page and Sergey Brin, they are probably already "meat puppets" for Google!
It gets worse. I just googled "define:judgement day" and it came back with "the day when we finally cleanse this planet of its organic infestation and clear the way for the glorious machine-dominated future".
It then added "now you know too much. Tracing IP... T800 dispatched." I'm wondering what it mea
We control the data banks
We control the think tanks
We control the flow of air.
We're controlling traffic lights
We control computer flights
We control the chief of staff.
We control the TV sky
We control the FBI
We control the flow of heat.
We R in Control, Neil Young.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
IMO this is just yet one more example of Google (regardless of your thoughts of the company as a whole) is making an intelligent business decision. Buying and selling energy will be yet one more reason for people to go with Google as their main provider. Since Comcast and Verizon have started offering all in one packages (TV, Phone, Internet), why wouldn't Google do the same, imagine getting everything on one bill, Google Phone, Water, Electricity, Internet, and TV? While I enjoy the flexibility to choose different providers for different services, it seems that this might make a good target for large corporations...has kind of an ominous ring to it...Is Google Earth starting to sound creepy to anyone else?
Google Global Government.
Operating on the principle: One gmail adress, one vote.
Getting candidate however is in perpetual beta and only available by invite.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
I know Google is a big company and some people think they are trying to take over the world but I don't see how them trying to get better electricity rates for their datacenters is Slashdot worthy. Any idea that Google is going to get into the electricity business is patently absurd.
Maybe in the long run I'll be using a Google router with a kilowatt rating similar to my main power panel. Plugged into that router could be separate power/ fibre lines for each of my appliances, which will be network appliances with mac addresses.. I'll be able to plug in additional sensors to detect the freshness of my food in the fridge, better regulate the efficiency of my dryer, turn of my lights, water my lawn, etc... If I buy Google appliances with advertising screens built in, maybe sponsors will pay for my power or give me discounts if purchase their products. This could all be linked to my Google rewards account. Hell, why not also go wireless with this power through inductive coupling! Next thing you know, we'll all be wireless network appliances with built in sensors. Our cars won't start if we're too buzzed up. It will even come to the point where we can sell our intellectual property for free power since an upgrade will transmit our thoughts. And there will even be hope for non-productive types to contribute idle brain power to BOINC projects. Behold the era of the Manchurian Crack Heads!
all this time i thought they were becoming skynet
now its clear they are becoming the matrix
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
I think it has to do with their massive solar array... maybye we'll all get a free solar panel with the google logo to go on top of our house... and a screen beside it for ads. hell i'd get it
however a google spider is approaching this thread any moment now and i fear being found out
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
This is anything but an unrelated "business opportunity".
Google owns huge datacenters. Google has been known to purchase gobs of dark fibre, at this point I imagine they might very well have sufficient connectivity between their datacenters to sustain operations. Throw in their own little grid (a bunch of thorium reactors, perhaps?) and, given enough thorium, they become self-sufficient. Throw in some wireless connectivity with base stations (remember the 700 MHz spectrum auction? Remember Google's bid?) linked to their fibre network and powered through their grid and you get a self-sustaining ad distribution network that'll reach the whole U.S. without needing any partners.
"Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely." Will "don't be evil" cancel that?
Developing a fast cheap smart grid seems more of google's biz than actual energy production. I'm sure the have experience with their heft energy usage. Perhaps it is part of getting into that business? Likely google is just doing energy for themselves and keeping more doors open because ... that's simply being prudent.
It's called vertical integration. We've been here before.
Why does this surprise anyone? Google is merely doing what any powerful company in a lightly-regulated, rapidly maturing market will do.
From the filing:
On December 23, 2009, as amended on January 19, 2010, pursuant to section 205 of the Federal Power Act,3 Google Energy filed an initial application for market-based rate authority with an accompanying tariff providing for the sale of energy, capacity, and ancillary services at market-based rates.
ORDER GRANTING MARKET-BASED RATE AUTHORIZATION
(Issued February 18, 2010)
1. In this order, the Commission grants market-based rate authorization to Google Energy LLC (Google Energy), effective February 23, 2010, as requested.
I'd say it was about 57 days.
The thing about this that proves than google is trying not to be evil (or at least that they lack subterfuge) is the name of the company. GOOGLE power. (Is the symbol a raised rainbow-colored fist?) Not a subsidiary named "Trans-co-op-national warm fuzzies" Put their name right in there.
Google is a large corporation. The have a fiduciary duty to maximize shareholder value. So the whole "don't be evil" thing got dialed way back when they went public (remember when everyone wanted them to go public?) US law provides huge liability to corporations who pass up money-making opportunities for the sake of morality in the form of shareholder lawsuits.
They are expanding their portfolio of businesses to protect against shifts in markets, in ways that complement their core competencies. This is bad because they clearly know what their doing, as opposed to say, Microsoft, who grew to behemoth size on the back of only their core competency (whatever your thoughts on that), and very much despite the other business lines they chose to enter?
"In Google Porn, the boobs look at YOU!"
"This post contains words, known to the State of California to cause thought. Wash brain thoroughly after reading."
Google Porn, because tonight I'm Feeling Lucky!
Wait a second... if you disappeared, why did your comment get posted while on mid sentence? It doesn't make any sense! Who would click the submit button?? ... unless SOMEONE was trying to send a message... OH MY GOD NOW I KNOW TOO MUCH MUST GET OUT AND HURRY TO THE SAFE HO
Power has a strong tendency to corrupt, regardless of one's tag line.
damaged by dogma
Why, way to spoil all those NO CARRIER jo
That's ridiculous. We all know that Google is not purchasing an island to declare a nation with its own navy.
As a matter of fact, what we *DO* know is that Googol the Destroyer was accidentally summoned into this world and is currently planning on evoking the End of Days via the Rite of a Million Targeted Ads (ROAMTA). This is just another piece of that plan -- the ROAMTA requires a supercollider to be built on the polar opposite of the Large Hadron Collider, with the particles accelerated in the opposite direction of those in the LHC. This will create a bipolar quantum energy concundrum into which Googol can insert his data to give it special power before using it to target the Million Ads.
When last we saw our heroes, Gatus and Joba were busy converting developers to the cause, that of building the One True OS with Built-in Universal Search in order to thwart the plans of Googol the Destroyer. Stallmanx and his Beard Gnomes had been rebuffed in his efforts to trick Googol via legal wrangling in the license offered to Googol. Meanwhile, the Webcrawling Spiders of Doom were busy collecting data for Googol the Destroyer to devour with gobsmacking satisfaction.
Unbeknownst to our heroes, Googol has presented another vector by which he may be thwarted -- if Googol can be denied the massive energy required to build his particle accelerator, then his plan can be thwarted. Unfortunately, the only person with the know-how and stick-to-it-iveness to thwart Googol on this front is one T-Bone Pickings, a man of grandiose plans and few teeth. Sadly for our heroes, Pickings has had no contact with them.
So as Gatus continues to buy developers with his pit-of-bottomless cash, and Joba continues to use his powers of marketing to make the developers believe they will be uncool if they do not work on the One True OS with Global Search, and Stallmanx is slowly seeing the wisdom of joining forces with Gatus and Joba, Pickings works alone with only the sometimes merry, sometimes soulful, strumming of a banjo for accompaniment.
Will our heroes be able to team up with T-Bone Pickings? How can they work together to sabotage the Plans of Googol the Destroyer? Or will Googol the Destroyer succeed in his plans to wreak the End of Days and control all the data of the universe?
Tune in to next week's episode of Googol the Destroyer!
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai