Commercial, Sourcing Renewables  -  October 6, 2020

Iron Mountain increases resiliency of RE sources

Iron Mountain announced Oct. 6 a new project focused on continuously and cost-effectively powering their data centers in five states with renewable energy using risk management tools that increase reliability.

Birch Infrastructure created a solution for Iron Mountain using energy produced at the Ringer Hill Wind Farm in Pennsylvania and the Dermott Wind project in Texas that will be financially firmed up into reliable 24/7 service. The data center provider previously completed PPAs with the two wind farms in 2016 and 2017.

"Iron Mountain's Data Center business has been powered with 100% renewable energy since 2017,” Mark Kidd, Iron Mountain's Executive Vice President and General Manager of Data Centers, said in a statement. “Power Purchase Agreements with projects such as Ringer Hill and Dermott are a key part of that strategy. Birch has enabled us to manage the risks inherent in this type of agreement and confidently enter into additional agreements to responsibly power our rapidly growing data center footprint.”

The system put together by Birch and REsurety, a provider of valuation and risk management in renewable energy, allows corporate clean energy purchasers to limit their exposure to variability from weather and power market fluctuations when engaging renewable energy. Birch incorporated two weather-linked risk management products to improve on the standard VPPA– a Settlement Guarantee Agreement (SGA) and a Volume Firming Agreement (VFA).

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