Two Greenpeace activists were arrested outside of Apple’s headquarters in Cupertino, California after staging a protest against the company’s use of “unclean” energy in the massive computing facilities that supply its iCloud service.
On Tuesday morning, according to Greenpeace, two of its activists “barricaded” themselves inside a giant iPod outside Apple HQ, broadcasting audio messages that ask the tech giant to use renewable energy rather than coal to power its iCloud data centers. Both activists were arrested and taken to the Santa Clara County jail, according to a Greenpeace spokeswoman.
Four other Greenpeace activists, who stood outside of the giant “iPod”, wore giant iPhone costumes, and were not arrested. So, activists, pay attention; iPhone costumes, legal. Giant iPod, illegal. (Maybe it’s just me, but the giant “iPod” looks more like an older model Airport Extreme, or even the base to an early iMac.)
The protest is part of Greenpeace’s continuing series of protests in an effort to bring attention to how the popular “cloud services” from the tech companies are powered. Greenpeace has also staged protests against Microsoft, Amazon, and Facebook. (Greenpeace didn’t have any activists dress up as a Windows Phone, rightly assuming no one would recognize what one looked like.)
Apple’s iCloud online storage service is backed by a 500,000-square-foot data center in Maiden, North Carolina. The facility is powered by Duke Energy, which gets 46 percent of its power from coal, and 52 percent from nuclear facilities. Apple has said that the Maiden facility will soon use close to 60 percent renewable energy, the company is installing a solar array and biogas plant near the data center.
Greenpeace has stated that Apple should commit to running the entire facility on renewable energy. Apple published a statement saying it believes that the new solar array and the biogas plant will make Maiden “the greenest data center ever built” and that the new facility it’s building in Prineville, Oregon will run on 100 percent renewable energy.
I can just imagine what the jail conversations will be like: “What are ya in for?” “I put myself in a giant iPod outside of Apple HQ to protest the use of unclean energy for Apple’s iCloud. Then the ‘man’ came and arrested me and put me here.” “Uh-huh, OK. You know you’re sittin’ on my bunk, right?”