[amluto]

Which indicates that something is wrong with the residential electricity markets. Google should not be paying substantially less for marginal electricity than Google’s customers.

(This is a major problem with California’s energy planning. On the one hand, CA (IMO fairly sensibly) wants users to switch from gas to electricity. On the other hand, CA’s electricity prices are so egregiously inflated that people have an economic incentive to switch from electricity to gas.)

[sofixa]

Google have some datacenters with dedicated renewable power generation (e.g. Belgium) they set up themselves, so it makes sense sometimes their electricity is cheaper.

[nightski]

I'm not sure about in Europe, but in the U.S. at least a substantial portion of power generation is already from renewables. That doesn't really make it free, or necessarily even cheaper depending on the circumstances.

[sofixa]

It makes it cheaper for Google if they build it themselves for their DC than to buy at market rates such as they are today.

[zeppelin101]

> Which indicates that something is wrong with the residential electricity markets. Google should not be paying substantially less for marginal electricity than Google’s customers.

In a more perfect world, that would be the case!

[kjeetgill]

Not at all. We want companies to leverage economies of scale. Efficiency should bring competitive advantage. Google often invests in datacenters in places based around where it's cheaper to power and run them, often owning the energy production.

This is a good thing

[cinntaile]

Often using subsidies and tax advantages so whether it's cheaper overall for society will depend on the cost of these venefits.

[amluto]

But of limited value for a service like Stadia. Power may be cheaper 1000 miles away, but those 1000 miles cost latency.