By Frank Andorka, Senior Correspondent

What Happened: Microsoft, in an interview with Greentech Media, explained why it was turning to approximately 60 MW of distributed solar to power its data centers in Singapore. Essentially:

• The company said it had been burned before when it tried to build utility-scale solar projects in other countries, thanks to permitting issues and other local constrictions.
• The limited land in Singapore to build a large-scale solar plant left them with one option that the city-state has in abundance: rooftop space.

Singapore’s skyline will have more rooftop distributed solar to power Microsoft’s data centers in the city-state.

SolarWakeup’s View: Microsoft, which doesn’t even appear on the Top 10 Businesses for solar in the United States, has decided to make a splash in Singapore by commissioning 60 MW of rooftop solar to power its data centers, Greentech Media reports.

Why distributed solar instead of the typical utility-scale solar plants it would fund? Well, the answer to that is simple – there’s just not enough land to do it properly.

After all, the city-state is only 277 square miles, total. And what land area it does have is densely packed with skyscrapers. Even if it wanted to do so, Microsoft would find it difficult to find enough open land to build a solar farm big enough to keep up with their data centers’ rapacious demand for energy.

Secondly, with distributed solar on the rooftops of downtown buildings, Microsoft runs less risk of the entire project going belly-up as they have seen in other countries in which they do business. This gives the massive software conglomerate the ability to control its own electrical future.

Microsoft’s solution to its land problem should hearten U.S. business that want to go solar but don’t feel as if they could find the space to build a solar project big enough to power their operations. New York City is already figuring this out, and maybe Microsoft can set the example other large corporations in the United States can follow to make their own solar dreams come true.

More:

Why Is Microsoft Getting Into Rooftop Solar?