Public Policy Blog
Updates on technology policy issues
Voting tools for volunteers on the go
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Posted by Steve Kanefsky and Jerry Morrison, Google Mobile engineers
(Cross-posted from the
Google Mobile Blog
)
With the U.S. elections less than a week away, voting drives are ramping up. Political parties and non-partisan groups alike are sending out volunteers to encourage citizens to vote on November 4. To make sure these volunteers have the same
voter info tools
available to them on their phone as on their computer, we've now launched a mobile voting locator tool on
m.google.com/elections
.
(Click
here
to send this to your phone.)
Now, volunteers can type in the home address of any registered voter and find his or her voting location, whether they're in an office making phone calls, working from a booth set up outdoors, or going door to door. While on the go, they can use
Google Maps for mobile
to find their next address or display directions to voting locations.
Of course, between talking to potential voters, volunteers can check out the Elections section in Google News for mobile for the latest updates (go
here
on your phone), or just search for a nearby coffee shop to stay warm.
Take a Vote Hour
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Posted by Andy Berndt, Managing Director, Google Creative Lab, and Katie Jacobs Stanton, Elections Team
(Cross-posted from the
Official Google Blog
)
In less than two weeks, every vote will count as Americans decide who will become the next U.S. president. During the last national election in 2004, 20 percent of registered voters who didn't make it to the polls said that they were "too busy" or had conflicting work schedules (
2004 U.S. Census
).
The
Vote Hour
is an independent, bipartisan effort among CEOs across America to publicly announce their support for employees to step away from their desks and take an hour to cast a ballot. Just a few of those leaders appear in the video below, encouraging their employees to take a Vote Hour on November 4th.
We hope more business leaders across the country will
join the movement
, add their names and their encouragement to the effort. Employees can send
emails
to their bosses to encourage them to participate as well.
So spread the word to your friends, families and colleagues to take a Vote Hour. And most importantly, don't forget to vote yourself. It's the most important job you have on Election Day.
New steps to protect free expression and privacy around the world
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Posted by Andrew McLaughlin, Director of Public Policy and Government Affairs
(Cross-posted from the
Official Google Blog
)
In a world where governments all too often censor what their citizens can see and do on the Internet, Google has from the start promoted global free expression and taken the lead in being transparent with our users. We've pressed governments around the world to stop limiting free speech and made it possible for dissidents, bloggers and others to have their voices heard.
As part of those ongoing efforts to promote free expression and protect our users' privacy, today we're announcing Google's participation as a founding company member of a new program called the Global Network Initiative. (The site, at globalnetworkinitiative.org, will be live within a day or so.)
This initiative is the result of two years of discussions with other leading technology companies, human rights organizations, socially responsible investors and academic institutions. Thanks to hard work and cooperation from all parties, the Initiative sets the kinds of standards and practices that all companies and groups should use when governments threaten internationally recognized rights to free expression and privacy.
The Global Network Initiative also offers an important commitment from all parties to take action together to promote free expression and protect privacy in the use of all information and communication technologies. We know that common action by these diverse groups is more likely to bring about change in government policies than the efforts of any one company or group acting alone.
Companies that join the Initiative commit to putting into effect procedures that will protect their users by:
Evaluating against international standards government requests to censor content or access user information
Providing greater transparency
Assessing human rights risks when entering new markets or introducing new products
Instituting employee training and oversight programs
These are things that Google does now, but joining the Initiative will help us refine our methods and maintain our leadership position. Down the road companies will be assessed on how they're doing in implementing the principles and the Initiative will report those results.
This Initiative is by no means a silver bullet or the last word, but it does represent a concrete step toward promoting freedom of expression and protecting users' privacy in the 60th anniversary year of the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
. Now we're actively recruiting more companies and groups to join the Initiative and advance these critical human rights around the world.
New chapter for Google Book Search
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Posted by David Drummond, Senior Vice President, Corporate Development, and Chief Legal Officer
(Cross-posted from the
Official Google Blog
)
Google was built on the principle of making the world's information more accessible and useful. Before the company was even founded, Larry and Sergey imagined a way to make it easier for anyone, anywhere, to access the information held within the world's books. Search simply isn't complete without that content, and providing more access to more books is a vision Google has never lost sight of.
Four years ago,
almost to the date
, we first announced
Google Book Search
. Since we launched the service, we've heard countless
stories
about Book Search helping readers all over the world find books in over 100 languages on topics as diverse as
The Physics of Star Trek
and the history of
Wood Carvings in English Churches
. We've seen millions of people click to buy books or find them in a library, and more than 20,000 publishers have joined our Partner Program to allow readers to preview the books they find before buying them.
While we've made tremendous progress with Book Search, today
we've announced an agreement
with a broad class of authors and publishers and with our library partners that advances Larry's and Sergey's original dream in ways Google never could have done
alone.
This agreement is truly groundbreaking in three ways. First, it will give readers digital access to millions of in-copyright books; second, it will create a new market for authors and publishers to sell their works; and third, it will further the efforts of our library partners to preserve and maintain their collections while making books more accessible to students, readers and academic researchers.
The agreement also resolves lawsuits that were brought against Google in 2005 by a group of authors and publishers, along with the Authors Guild and Association of American Publishers (AAP). While Google, the Authors Guild and the AAP have
disagreed
on copyright law, we have always agreed about the importance of creating new ways for users to find books and for authors and publishers to get paid for their works.
To date, Google has worked with libraries all over the world to make more than 7 million books searchable through Google Book Search, and we're just getting started. We believe that ultimately we'll provide access to many times that number, and if approved, this agreement will unlock access to millions of these texts and make the Google search experience even more comprehensive.
With this agreement, in-copyright, out-of-print books will now be available for readers in the U.S. to search, preview and buy online -- something that was simply unavailable to date. Most of these books are difficult, if not impossible, to find. They are not sold through bookstores or held on most library shelves, yet they make up the vast majority of books in existence. Today, Google only shows snippets of text from the books where we don't have copyright holder permission. This agreement enables people to preview up to 20% of the book.
What makes this settlement so powerful is that in addition to being able to find and preview books more easily, users will also be able to read them. And when people read them, authors and publishers of in-copyright works will be compensated. If a reader in the U.S. finds an in-copyright book through Google Book Search, he or she will be able to pay to see the entire book online. Also, academic, library, corporate and government organizations will be able to purchase institutional subscriptions to make these books available to their members. For out-of-print books that in most cases do not have a commercial market, this opens a new revenue opportunity that didn't exist before.
It's important to note this agreement doesn't change our Partner Program, which currently includes more than 20,000 publishers around the world, but it does add a new way for those publishers to sell access to their works. For in-print books not in our Partner Program, we'll continue to scan these books through our Library Project and make them full-text searchable, but we won't show any portion of the book. As for books in the public domain, this agreement doesn't change how we display them: We'll make out-of-copyright works freely available on Google Book Search for people to read and download.
As part of the agreement, Google is also funding the establishment of a Book Rights Registry, managed by authors and publishers, that will work to locate and represent copyright holders. We think the Registry will help address
the "orphan" works problem
for books in the U.S., making it easier for people who want to use older books. Since the Book Rights Registry will also be responsible for distributing the money Google collects to authors and publishers, there will be a strong incentive for rightsholders to come forward and claim their works.
In addition to expanding the commercial market for these books, Google, the authors and the publishers have worked hard with our library partners at Stanford, the University of Michigan, the University of California and the University of Wisconsin-Madison to ensure this agreement advances libraries' efforts to preserve, maintain and provide access to books for students, researchers and readers. The agreement gives public and university libraries across the U.S. free, full-text viewing of books at a designated computer in each of their facilities. That means local libraries across the U.S. will be able to offer their patrons access to the incredible collections of our library partners -- a huge benefit to the public.
The agreement also authorizes Google and the libraries to create new services that will help people with disabilities such as visual impairment better experience these books. We are grateful to our library partners for investing so much painstaking effort over so many years to maintain their book collections, and we are excited at the prospect of their participation in this landmark project.
Because the agreement is the result of a U.S. lawsuit, all of these services will be available to readers who access Google Book Search in the United States. Outside the U.S., the user experience with Google Book Search will be the same as it is today. In other words, people will be able to search the full text of books and may see snippets of in-copyright works, but they will not be able to preview or purchase access to books online, unless these services are authorized by the rightsholder of a book. It is important to note that the agreement does not affect users outside the U.S., but it will affect copyright holders worldwide because they can register their works and receive compensation for them. While this agreement only concerns books scanned in the U.S., Google is committed to working with rightsholders, governments, and relevant institutions to bring the same opportunities to users, authors, and publishers in other countries.
As you can imagine, we're all ready to get moving, but this project will take some time. First and foremost, the settlement administrator will be reaching out to educate authors and publishers worldwide about the agreement and their rights under it. The agreement also must be approved by the court. Once it's approved, we'll be ready to begin delivering these services. In the meantime, if you own or think you may own a U.S. copyright interest, there is more information about the agreement at
this
website
. And Google Book Search users can
find more information here
.
Hispanic College Fund scholars visit Google D.C.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Posted by Galen Panger, Global Communications and Public Affairs
Earlier this month, several of us recent college grads got the chance to sit down and chat with 35 scholars from the
Hispanic College Fund
about their interests and what it's like to work for Google in Washington, D.C. It was one of their last stops on a long week of lectures about professional development, so we tried to keep things on the lighter side.
After a discussion about some of the cool stuff that we've been working on -- like
Google for Non-Profits
and the
U.S. Voter Info
tool -- we took them on a tour of our multi-colored office before sitting down for lunch and more conversation.
We're
proud supporters
of the Hispanic College Fund, so it was an honor to meet some of the scholars and give them a bit of a break from their busy week. We hope they'll come visit us again soon.
Apply for summer 2009 Google Policy Fellowships
Friday, October 24, 2008
Posted by Jen Marsh, Policy Analyst and Joe Sexton, Fellowship Coordinator
Passionate about freeing the
white space airwaves
? Excited about about
privacy and data protection
? Interested in the debates surrounding
net neutrality
? If you're a undergraduate, graduate, or law student interested in in the world of tech policy, have we got a program for you.
After a successful first summer, we are excited to announce the launch of the 2009
Google Policy Fellowship
program. The Google Policy Fellowship program is our effort to replicate the success of our
Summer of Code
program in the public policy sphere and to support students and organizations doing work that is important to the future of Internet users everywhere. Our first class of
fellows
worked for ten weeks last summer at public interest organizations involved in debates on broadband and access policy, content regulation, copyright reform, consumer privacy, and open government.
Those selected as fellows for the 2009 summer will receive a stipend to spend ten weeks contributing to the public debate on technology policy issues -- ranging from broadband policy to copyright reform to open government. Our participating organizations include:
American Library Association
,
Cato Institute
,
Center for Democracy and Technology
,
Competitive Enterprise Institute
,
Electronic Frontier Foundation
,
Internet Education Foundation
,
Media Access Project
,
New America Foundation
,
Public Knowledge
. We are happy to welcome six additional organizations to participate in the 2009 summer:
Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic
,
The Citizen Lab
,
Creative Commons
,
Future of Music Coalition
,
Progress and Freedom Foundation
, and
Technology Policy Institute
.
Check out
more details
and the
application
, which is due by Friday, December 12, 2008. And please help us spread the word!
Helping America flip the digital TV switch
Friday, October 24, 2008
Posted by Johanna Shelton, Policy Counsel and Legislative Strategist
In less than four months, U.S. television broadcasting will switch from analog to digital, a more efficient and higher quality transmission system. At midnight on February 17, 2009, all full power television stations will transition to digital-only broadcasting.
This week, our friends at the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) launched a contest on YouTube to help consumers get ready. CEA is inviting YouTube users to create videos that will educate and inform others on how to prepare for the transition. Contest details can be found at
http://www.youtube.com/dtvtransition
.
Why is the country making this change? More than just better television, digital broadcasting will free up airwaves for emergency responder use and unleash a more open era of mobile communications.
By switching to a more efficient broadcasting system, valuable spectrum can now be used for new wireless services and enhanced public safety communications. The FCC already
auctioned
some of this spectrum. Google sought to ensure that, regardless of who won the auction, consumers would be able to connect any wireless device and download any application and content of their choosing. The winner of a key block of the spectrum, Verizon Wireless, will now be required to give consumers these historic new rights. The digital TV transition also promises to expand the amount of vacant TV "
white spaces
" spectrum that we hope is used for unlicensed advanced Wi-Fi-like services.
Before these benefits can be realized, we all have a responsibility to make sure our friends, families and fellow citizens aren't left in the dark when the
digital TV transition
happens on February 17, 2009.
What can you do? Help identify friends and family members who watch over-the-air television through analog TVs that are not connected to cable or satellite service. Encourage them to get a digital television or a TV converter box to keep their existing analog TVs working. Congress has created a converter box coupon program to provide coupons worth $40 to help households get the converter box equipment they need - see
www.dtv2009.gov
to apply for coupons. And, starting this week, you can also help spread the word by entering CEA's Convert Now contest on YouTube to win a new home entertainment center.
The popular country band Whiskey Falls has created a video to kick off the contest. Check it out -- and be sure to get your videos in before November 23:
Down to the wire on white spaces
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Posted by Richard Whitt, Washington Telecom and Media Counsel
(Cross-posted from the
Official Google Blog
)
There's more than one important vote going on this Election Day. On November 4, as Americans cast their ballots for President of the United States,
the Federal Communications Commission is scheduled to be voting
on rules governing "white spaces" -- the unused airwaves between broadcast TV channels.
Just as Wi-Fi sparked a revolution in the way we connect to the web, freeing the "white space" airwaves could help unleash a new wave of technological innovation, create jobs, and boost our economy. But it can happen only if the FCC moves forward with rules that make the best possible use of this spectrum.
Last week, after many months of thorough testing, the Commission's engineers announced their conclusion that white spaces devices could operate without interfering with TV broadcasts or wireless microphone signals. FCC Chairman Kevin Martin
pledged his support
for opening "white space" spectrum, and announced that the Commission would vote on the issue on November 4.
Unfortunately, last Friday the broadcasting lobby filed an emergency request to stop the vote from happening. This comes despite more than four years of study, months of extensive lab and field testing by the FCC, and tens of thousands of pages of formal record material -- during which the broadcasters' concerns were fully considered. As we understand it, the draft order carefully and appropriately addresses all legitimate concerns about interference, and the resulting draft rules are, if anything, overly conservative. Nonetheless, the proposed framework overall appears to be sound, and we strongly support it.
While the science should speak for itself, that won't stop the broadcasting lobby from trying to use stalling tactics to derail the technology before the rules of the road are even written.
These are the same folks who
over the years
have sought to block one innovative technology after another, from cable TV to VCRs to satellite TV and radio to low power FM to TiVOs.
The enormous promise of white spaces is simply too great to get bogged down now in politics. We're less than two weeks away from a vote that could transform the way we connect to the Internet.
The time for study and talk is over. The time for action has arrived. But we need your help -- before November 4th.
Two months ago we launched "Free the Airwaves" with a simple message: Americans want better access to broadband, and they see the potential of white spaces to make it happen. If you care about the future of technological innovation, please sign our petition to the FCC at
FreeTheAirwaves.com
, and ask your friends to do the same.
Greater access to voting information
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Posted by JL Needham, Public Sector Content Partnerships, and Abe Murray, Product Manager
(Cross-posted from the
Official Google Blog
)
At Google, we pride ourselves on helping people find things on the Internet. And every four years in America,
Google Trends
shows that people are searching to find voting information, like how to register and where to vote.
It's hard to believe that in 2008, information so important to U.S. citizens and the democratic process isn't well organized on the web. To solve this problem, we've released our
US Voter Info site
, an effort to simplify and centralize voting locations and registration information.
We developed the site in the hope that it will increase voter participation. We were helped by a number of partners, including many state and local election officials, the
League of Women Voters
, the
Pew Charitable Trusts
, and others involved in the
Voting Information Project
.
Are you registered to vote? What's the best way to obtain an absentee ballot? When people visit the site, answers to these questions appear. And anyone with a website can provide the same information. The
US Voter Info gadget
places a simple search box that expands to show a full set of voter information when someone enters an address.
We are also offering a simpler way to find out
where to vote
. By entering a home address, citizens across the country will be able to find their polling place for election day.
To encourage political participation, we've opened up this data to third-party sites and developers through an API developed by Dan Berlin, one of our open-source engineers. We're excited to share this data, and hope that others will find it useful in encouraging citizens to vote.
Organizing information is our mission. We do that every day with web content, and we want to do the same thing with information to inform and empower voters and to help them get to the polls this election season.
Quality scores and ad auctions
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Posted by Hal Varian, Chief Economist
(Cross-posted from the
Official Google Blog
)
There's some interest in how and why "quality scores" are used in search engine ad auctions. In this post, we will try to describe "why" we use quality scores; a later post will go into "how," including more information about bids.
When a user types a query into a search engine, it will typically return both natural search results and advertisements. Google and other major search engines use an
ad auction
to determine which ads are shown and how much advertisers pay for them.
In the auctions, advertisers enter bids that reflect how much they are willing to pay for a click on their ad -- this is called their maximum
cost per click
(CPC). Ads are then ordered by the product of the bid that is entered and the estimated ad
quality score
. People often ask why ad quality enters the formula -- isn't the bid per click enough? Why can't advertisers just buy their way to to the top ad position? To see why both components are important, let us look at a simple example.
Suppose that two advertisers are bidding on the keyword "jet airplane." Joe's Jets is selling actual jet airplanes, while Moe's Models is selling models of jet airplanes. Since jets are expensive, Joe is willing to pay a lot per click. But not many people can afford to buy jets, so Joe won't get many clicks. Moe, by contrast, is willing to pay a lot less per click, but he will also get many more clicks.
Which ad should be listed higher in the "sponsored links" section of the search results page?
What matters in this decision is not simply an advertiser's value for a single click -– the maximum CPC that the advertiser is willing to pay -- but rather the total estimated value of showing that ad: the value per click times the number of clicks that the ad is likely to receive.
The number of clicks that the ad is likely to receive depends on the historical
clickthrough rate
, which is an important component of the ad quality score. Thus the bid per click times the quality score gives us an estimate of the total value of displaying an ad over time. Joe's ad may have a higher value for a single click, but if Moe's ad gets a lot more clicks over time, it could easily have a greater total value. In that case, Moe's ad will be shown in the more prominent position. (Click on the image to view larger.)
The quality score gives search engines a way of aligning the incentives of the buyers, the sellers, and the viewers of ads. The search engine wants to sell ad impressions, but advertisers want to pay for clicks. The solution is for advertisers to bid on a cost-per-click basis, while the search engine estimates the total value of the ad over time: bid per click times the expected number of clicks.
This is a neat way to align incentives, but it has a problem: since the advertiser only pays on a per click basis, it may as well seek as many ad impressions as it can so that as many users as possible will be exposed to the ad. Joe might well want to buy the keywords "rocket ship" even if he only has jets to sell. Why not? Joe only has to pay if someone actually clicks on the ad.
This is where another distinct, but related quality issue arises: an ad that gets very few clicks shouldn't really be shown. It is just distracting from the viewpoint of users. The advertisers may not care much about annoying users but the search engine certainly does. Why? Because if it shows a lot of irrelevant ads, people will likely stop looking at or clicking on ads. They may develop a terrible affliction known in the trade as "ads blindness." Better ad relevance leads to a better user experience.
So search engines often apply a "disabling rule" that inhibits ads with very low clickthrough rates for a given query from being shown. Or they might set a relatively high minimum cost per click for ads that don't attract much interest from users as a way to discourage advertisers from showing ads that annoy users and deliver few clicks. A
high
cost per click can easily be consistent with a
low
cost per impression when clickthrough rates are low.
So why are quality scores important? Answer: they lead to a better auction by allowing advertisers to buy clicks, publishers to sell impressions, and users to see relevant ads.
FCC to vote on opening up "white spaces"
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Posted by Richard Whitt, Washington Telecom and Media Counsel
For nearly two years, a
broad-based coalition
of public interest groups and technology companies including Google has been advocating for unlicensed uses of the largely vacant airwaves
between broadcast TV channels
("white spaces"). This spectrum has the potential to dramatically transform the ways Americans connect to the Internet. And over the past two months, more than 18,000 Americans have joined the effort through
Free the Airwaves
.
Today FCC Chairman Kevin Martin
announced
that he wants to move forward with final rules to open up the vacant spectrum for use by broadband devices. Furthermore, press
reports
today indicate that the FCC's field testing showed that "there are no major interference problems" with TV and wireless microphone signals.
This news should be greatly encouraging for American consumers. The FCC now has more than enough information to develop appropriate rules that protect TV stations and wireless microphone users from harmful interference, while at the same time allowing innovators and entrepreneurs to develop technology that productively uses these airwaves.
Chairman Martin said today that he hopes to have the full commission vote on rules to govern these airwaves at the FCC's next public meeting, scheduled for November 4th. Coincidentally enough, we've called on the FCC to
take action by that day
.
Now is the time for the FCC to put the power of better and faster broadband in the hands of innovators and entrepreneurs. Please
sign the petition to the FCC at Free the Airwaves
to help make it happen.
Now's the time: Register to vote
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Posted by Katie Jacobs Stanton, Google Elections Team
(Cross-posted from the
Official Google Blog
)
Political participation is at an all-time high this election season, and a record number of voters have already started to cast ballots -- a few even camped out in Ohio to be the first in line for early voting yesterday.
But roughly 1 in 4 Americans still aren't registered to vote, according to the most recent
Census report
. Now is the time -- voter registration deadlines are less than a week away in most states.
We're trying to help increase participation by making sure you have easy access to voting information. Google's
Voter Info Map
currently puts registration, absentee and early voting information in one place. (If you're on a phone, you can check out our mobile version at
m.google.com/elections
).
We're working closely with state and local election officials, the
Voting Information Project
and the
League of Women Voters
to centralize official voting information. Stay tuned for more posts on the project and details on how you can help confirm your local polling place address.
Leonardo DiCaprio, will.i.am, Tobey Maguire, Forrest Whitaker and a few of their friends put together the first in a series of public service announcements to encourage young Americans to register to vote - and they include a link to our Voter Info Map.
As the Internet plays a greater role in helping people participate in elections, we're excited to help out. And you can, too. Help make sure everyone is ready for election day by reminding your friends and family to register and vote.
Clean Energy 2030
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Posted by Dan Reicher, Director, Climate Change and Energy Initiatives, and Jeffery Greenblatt, Climate and Energy Technology Manager, Google.org
(Cross-posted from the
Official Google Blog
)
Right now the U.S. has a very real opportunity to transform our economy from one running on fossil fuels to one largely based on clean energy. We are developing the technologies and know-how to accomplish this. We can build whole new industries and create millions of new jobs. We can reduce energy costs, both at the gas pump and at home. We can improve our national security. And we can put a big dent in climate change. With strong leadership we could be moving forward on an aggressive but realistic timeline and an approach that balances costs with real economic gains.
The energy team at Google has been crunching the numbers to see how we could greatly reduce fossil fuel use by 2030.
Our analysis
, led by Jeffery Greenblatt, suggests a potential path to weaning the U.S. off of coal and oil for electricity generation by 2030 (with some remaining use of natural gas as well as nuclear), and cutting oil use for cars by 40%. Al Gore has
issued a challenge
that is even more ambitious, getting us to carbon-free electricity even sooner. We hope the American public pushes our leaders to embrace it. T. Boone Pickens has weighed in with an interesting
plan
of his own to massively deploy wind energy, among other things. Other plans have also been developed in recent years that merit attention.
Our goal in presenting this first iteration of the
Clean Energy 2030 proposal
is to stimulate debate and we invite you to take a look and comment - or offer an alternative approach if you disagree. With a new Administration and Congress - and multiple energy-related imperatives - this is an opportune, perhaps unprecedented, moment to move from plan to action.
Over 22 years this plan could generate billions of dollars in savings and help create millions of green jobs. Many of these high quality, good-paying jobs will be in today's coal and oil producing states.
To get there we need immediate action on three fronts:
(1) Reduce demand by doing more with less
We should start with the low-hanging fruit by reducing energy demand through energy efficiency -- adopting technologies and practices that allow us to do more with less. At Google, we've seen the benefits of this approach. We identified $5M in building efficiency investments with a 2.5 year payback. We've also
designed our own data centers to run more efficiently
, and we believe they are the most efficient in the world. On a smaller scale, personal computers can also become much more efficient. A typical desktop PC wastes nearly half the power it consumes. Last year, Bill Weihl, our Green Energy Czar, worked with industry partners to create the
Climate Savers Computing Initiative
to raise energy efficiency standards for personal computers and servers. If we meet our goals, these standards will cut energy consumption by the equivalent of 10-20 coal-fired power plants by 2010.
Government can have a big impact on achieving greater efficiency. California's aggressive building codes, efficiency standards and utility programs have helped the state keep per-capita energy use flat for years, while consumption in much of the rest of the country has grown significantly. Enacting similar policies at the national level would help even more.
We also need to give the American people opportunities to be more efficient. The way we buy electricity today is like going to a store without seeing prices: we pick what we want, and receive an unintelligible bill at the end of the month. When homes are equipped with smart meters and real-time pricing, research shows that energy use typically drops. Google is looking at ways that we can use our information technology and our reach to help increase awareness and bring better, real-time information to consumers.
(2) Develop renewable energy that is cheaper than coal (RE<C)
Google’s data centers draw from a U.S. electricity grid that relies on coal for 50% of its power. We want to help catalyze the development of renewable energy that is price competitive with coal. At least three technologies show tremendous promise: wind, solar thermal, and advanced geothermal. Each of these is abundant and, when combined, could supply energy in virtually every region of the U.S.
This year
Google has invested
over $45 million in startup companies with breakthrough wind, solar and geothermal technologies through our Renewable Energy Cheaper than Coal (
RE<C
) initiative, but that is a drop when we need a flood. We need to unleash massive private investment in clean energy. The government can have a big impact here as well. We must dramatically increase federal R&D and enact measures supporting the rapid deployment and scaling of clean technologies such as long-term tax support and a national renewable energy standard. Tax credits for wind and solar have lapsed several times in the last 20 years, starving these nascent industries of the capital they need to truly enter the mainstream.
We also must work both sides of the
RE<C
equation. Progress will be accelerated when the price of carbon reflects its true costs to society. Putting a price on carbon through cap-and-trade or a carbon tax would help address this.
(3) Electrify transportation and re-invent our electric grid
Imagine driving a car that uses no gas and is less expensive to recharge than buying a latte. A "smart grid" allows you to charge when electricity is cheap, and maybe even make some money by selling unused power back to the grid when it's needed. Plug-in cars are on their way, with GM, Toyota and other manufacturers planning introductions in the next two years. At Google we have a small fleet of Toyota Prius and Ford Escape plug-in conversions, as a part of our
RechargeIT program
. The converted Prius plug-ins
get over 90 MPG
, and the Escapes close to 50 MPG. However to successfully put millions of plug-in cars on the road and and fuel them with green electricity, we need a smart grid that manages when we charge and how we're billed. A smart grid could also provide for the two-way flow of electricity, as well as large-scale integration of intermittent solar and wind energy. Much of the technology in our current electrical grid was developed in the 60s and is wasteful and not very smart. We are
partnering with GE
to help accelerate the development of the smart grid and support building new transmission lines to harness our nation's vast renewable energy resources.
We see a huge opportunity for the nation to confront our energy challenges. In the process we will stimulate investment, create jobs, empower consumers and, by the way, help address climate change.
Labels
Accessibility
5
Ad
2
Advertising
11
AdWords
2
Anti-defamation league
1
Book Search
16
Broadband
11
Business Issues
26
Buzz
1
buzzemail
1
Canada
1
Child Safety
18
Chrome
1
Cloud Computing
2
Competition
19
Congress
10
Constitute
1
copyright
7
Cuba
1
Cybersecurity
9
D.C. Talks
16
Digital Due Process
1
Digital Playbook
1
Economic Impact
5
Economy
13
ECPA
4
Elections
24
email
1
Energy Efficiency
29
Europe
2
FCC
7
fellowship
2
Fighting Human Trafficking
1
Free Expression
54
Geo
1
Gmail
1
GNI
2
Good to Know
5
Google Fellow
2
Google for Entrepreneurs
1
Google Ideas
2
Google Maps
1
Google Policy Fellowship
1
Google Tools
78
Government Transparency
33
Hate Speech
1
Health
5
How Google Fights Piracy
1
Human trafficking
1
Identity theft
1
Immigration
1
Intellectual Property
19
International
46
Journalists
1
Malware
1
Maps
1
National Consumer Protection Week
1
Net Neutrality
24
Patents
5
piracy. ad networks
2
Politicians at Google
11
Politics
23
Privacy
93
Public Policy
1
Public Policy Blog
806
Safe Browsing
3
scams
1
search
3
Security
17
Small Businesses
3
spectrum
4
State Issues
5
Surveillance
6
Technology for Good
1
Telecom
71
Trade
3
Transparency Report
4
White Spaces
23
WiFi Network
1
Workforce
5
Yahoo-Google Deal
5
YouTube
4
YouTube for Government
1
Archive
2016
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Mar
2015
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2014
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2013
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2012
Dec
Nov
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2011
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2010
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2009
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2008
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Mar
Feb
Jan
2007
Dec
Nov
Oct
Sep
Aug
Jul
Jun
May
Apr
Feed
Follow @googlepubpolicy
Give us feedback in our
Product Forums
.
.jpg)
