Green web hosting
We have a commitment to renewable energy and offset far more carbon than we produce.
Committed to
Renewable energy
We use a mix of public cloud providers. At the bottom of this page we outline, and link to, the energy policies of each infrastructure provider. We are almost certain that every single server we provision is powered entirely by renewable energy. For instance, both Google and Amazon operate their own wind farms.
However, you will note that some of those providers, for example DigitalOcean, do not explicitly state their energy policy for each location. This is because they sometimes use colocation providers such as Equinix where they are not in control of the energy mix.
We therefore take an extremely proactive approach to ensuring every Stablepoint service is carbon neutral. We calculate our entire energy usage, regardless of source, and offset it twice over. In effect, this means that we are offsetting renewable energy, as if it were actually non-renewable -- twice!
This includes web server power consumption, as well as staff consumption and commute estimations.
How we offset
We will plant 2,000 trees this year
We plant a tree for every 10 websites hosted with us. By our calculation, this offsets our carbon footprint between two and four times over. We offset all of our usage irrespective of the source.
In our calculations, we convert the average power usage of each of our servers in Watts to kWH and then to CO2 released based on Greenhouse gas reporting: conversion factors from the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. The conversion factor they give is 0.28307 kg CO2 for each kWh produced. This is based on the emissions generated by the current UK power stations per kWh generated.
We undertake tree planting projects in our office locations, and also through partner organisations and charities, the largest being Ecologi (formerly known as Offset.earth), who provide verifiable figures and information relating to their tree planting projects. You can find out more about our Ecologi contributions here.
Local projects
Making a difference to the local environment
We are lucky to have offices in some of the most beautiful locations. Some of the work we do is with projects in the areas we are delighted to call home.
In the Cotswolds
We worked with the Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust to plant a fruit tree orchard over 4 acres.
We planted an assortment of local heritage apples, cider apples, eating apples and cooking apples. as well as some cherry, plum and pear. The trees were planted as two-year-old saplings in 2018, and will reach full height within 10 years.
The orchard will help to increase biodiversity and encourage the increased presence of bees and butterflies.
In Indonesia
Through our partnership Ecologi we are able to partake in funding projects around the world. One of the chosen projects is the 75MW Sidrap windfarm in South Sulawesi Province, Indonesia. This includes not only the wind farm itself, but also 22 local co-benefit projects such as clean water and sanitation deployments.
Energy policies by provider
Each public cloud provider has their own energy policy. Here we explain the fundamentals and link to their information pages.
Providers
- Shared hosting
- Reseller hosting
- Dedicated servers
Amazon Web Services
AWS have a 100% renewable energy commitment, and are building out dedicated wind farms around the world to power their own datacentres. See their sustainability policy.
Google Cloud Platform
100% renewable. Google purchase renewable energy to match or exceed any consumption. Read their energy policy and commitments.
Microsoft Azure
Microsoft has been carbon neutral since 2012 and is committed to being carbon negative by 2030. Read their environmental policy.
DigitalOcean
Confirmed 100% renewable in all locations aside from Bangalore, where the status is non-disclosed. London, Amsterdam & Frankfurt are on green grids, while Singapore, San Francisco, Toronto and New York City are from 100% renewable suppliers.
Linode
Linode servers are 100% renewable in all locations we offer (London, Frankfurt, Singapore, Tokyo).
Alibaba Cloud
We are not able to find published energy data, though some datacentres are powered with innovative fresh water cooling. However, Alibaba are very strong on CSR, including poverty relief in China. See their CSR and sustainability hub.
Managed WordPress
- Managed WordPress
Google Cloud Platform
100% renewable. Google purchase renewable energy to match or exceed any consumption. Read their energy policy and commitments.
Power usage calculation
To get as accurate a figure as possible to our actual energy usage, we have broken down our power usage by area. Not only are the below figures pessimistic, and not only is almost all of the energy we use renewable, but we nevertheless take the output from the below and offset it three times over!
Web servers
Web servers include each individual shared or reseller server, as well as dedicated machines. We work out average usage per server and multiple that by the number of servers have active each month.
10.5 watts
Per core
744 hours
Per month
8 cores
Per server (on average)
~60 kWH
Monthly energy usage per server
41 tonnes
Annual CO2 output across all of our servers
Office costs
All of our staff work in our offices, but we tend to have fairly substantial desktop computers as well as phones and laptops. We therefore assume the following:
1 desktop computer
Per person
2 monitors
Per person
1 laptop
Per person
2 phones
Per person
3.14159 cups of coffee
Per day per person
Commute and travel
Not only do we commute to work each day, but we also travel between offices for training. Many team members take public transport or cycle, but we over-estimate.
10 miles
Per person
2 short haul flights
Per person per year
2 international flights
Per person per year
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