The internet doesn’t run on magic; it runs on electricity. Behind every seamless video stream, every secure banking transaction, and every line of code deployed at the edge, there is a physical cost measured in kilowatt-hours. As the digital world accelerates — driven by AI, streaming, and global connectivity — the demand for compute power is skyrocketing.
At Akamai, we sit at the intersection of this demand and the planet's finite resources. As Akamai Cloud expands to meet the world’s need for distributed computing, we face a critical reality: We must decouple our digital growth from our carbon footprint. We cannot simply consume more power; we must actively generate clean power.
We refuse to let the expansion of the edge come at the expense of the climate.
Today, we are backing that commitment with action. We are sharing a significant operational milestone: Akamai has secured approximately 128 megawatts (MW) of new renewable energy capacity across the United States and the European Union.
These aren't just paper agreements or unbundled certificates. They are physical infrastructure projects — steel, glass, and wire — that are actively cleaning the grids that power our lives and our customers' businesses.
The strategy: Impact over volume
To understand the significance of these projects, you have to look past the megawatt count and understand our philosophy. At Akamai, we don't just buy “green energy” certificates to check a compliance box. We prioritize emissionality.
This concept reshapes how we measure success. Simply put, not all renewable energy is created equal. Bringing a new solar farm online in a region that is already 90% clean (like parts of the Nordic countries) has a relatively low carbon return. Conversely, bringing that exact same solar farm online in a grid heavily dependent on coal or natural gas delivers a massive environmental ROI.
We actively target these carbon-intensive grids for our “purchaser-caused” projects. We prefer to build where the air needs clearing. By directing our capital to these specific markets, we displace fossil fuels directly and maximize the amount of carbon avoided for every megawatt-hour (MWh) we generate. We don't just go where the sun shines; we go where the grid needs us most.
Here is how that strategy is translating into real-world power today.
United States: Cleaning up the grid in Illinois
The United States is the bedrock of our global operations and a pri mary driver of our edge compute growth. As we expand our capacity to serve North American enterprises, we are simultaneously working to decarbonize the grids that support them. We believe that digital leadership requires environmental stewardship.
We are proud to confirm that the Prairie Solar Project in Champaign County, Illinois, is officially online and running at full capacity.
This location was selected not for convenience, but for impact. The project sits within the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) North grid, a region that has historically relied heavily on fossil fuels for baseload power. By injecting clean solar energy here, the emissions displacement is significantly higher than in cleaner grids. We are directly displacing carbon-intensive generation with every MWh produced:
Capacity: 45 MW share
Annual generation: ~77,000 MWh
Carbon impact: Displacing ~48,000 metric tonnes of CO2e annually
This is what emissionality looks like in practice: replacing high-carbon electrons with low-carbon ones where it matters most.
European Union: Powering a cleaner European edge
The European Union is a cornerstone of the digital economy and a rapidly growing region for Akamai Cloud. As enterprises across the continent move workloads to the edge to improve performance and meet data sovereignty requirements, our footprint is expanding to meet them.
However, we refuse to grow our carbon emissions alongside our server count. We are matching this compute scaling with a deliberate investment in local, sustainable infrastructure that supports the European Union’s own ambitious climate goals.
We are announcing two major projects in the European Union that leverage the continent's mature renewable market and robust grid infrastructure:
Akamai EU solar project 1
Akamai EU solar project 2
Akamai EU solar project 1 (online now)
As of January 2026, this 50 MW installation is fully operational.
Annual generation: ~58,000 MWh
Carbon impact: Displacing ~45,000 metric tonnes of CO2e annually
Akamai EU solar project 2 (coming July 2026)
Construction is on schedule for this 33 MW facility, set to come online in July 2026.
Annual generation: ~36,000 MWh
Carbon impact: Displacing ~28,000 metric tonnes of CO2e annually
The “So what?” for our customers
Sustainability is a shared responsibility. When Akamai lowers our carbon footprint, we lower yours, too.
For our enterprise customers, these projects translate directly into Scope 3 emissions reductions. By running your applications and security workloads on Akamai Cloud, you are using a platform that is actively decarbonizing its energy supply chain.
Furthermore, these long-term commitments do more than just clean our own operations — they enable new infrastructure for everyone. By signing multi-year virtual power purchase agreements (vPPAs), we provide the revenue certainty that developers need to secure financing and break ground.
We aren't just consuming renewable energy; we are actively helping to build the capacity that the global grid desperately needs.
The road to 2030
These projects bring us closer to our goal of a 100% renewably powered Akamai and net-zero emissions by 2030. But net zero is an operational roadmap, not a marketing slogan.
We know that “efficiency” is just the starting line. True sustainability requires adding new clean capacity to the global grid. It requires transparency, accurate data, and a commitment to doing the hard work of infrastructure development.
A faster, more secure internet must also be a cleaner one. Today, we are 128 MW closer to that reality.
Learn more
Visit us for more information on Akamai’s sustainability initiatives and our path to 2030.
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