Enchanted Rock’s gas-powered microgrid in San Jose, the construction of which was announced in June 2022, will use gas made from food waste as backup power. This microgrid will offer energy resilience to the nearby Microsoft data center when outages affect the area or when the local grid tells facilities to reduce power as California’s Base Interruptible Power (BIP) protocol demands. 

Enchanted Rock, which is a microgrid manufacturer based out of Houston, stated that it would be using this biogas to offset the site’s natural gas expenditure, injecting it into pipes that deliver natural gas to its San Jose microgrid. The biogas would be added upstream and away from the facility.

Procuring Biogas: Working With U.S. Energy

For months, the question was where the biogas would come from. In December of 2023, Enchanted Rock shared the answer. 

The company revealed that the biogas would come from U.S. Energy. This company is a provider of energy that works with environmental credits and alternative fuels. It will use its expertise in this area to inject the food waste gas into the existing pipes, allowing the microgrid to run on a combination of fossil gas and biogas.

The biogas initiative will help Microsoft’s overarching goal: to have a zero-carbon microgrid. This was an essential factor for the company as well as for Enchanted Rock when the project was first developed. How will they accomplish this? By ensuring that all of the gas that the site consumes is matched to biogas injected into the grid. 

U.S. Energy states that the biogas won’t be blended but will be cleaned and conditioned to match pipeline quality standards. Enchanted Rock and Microsoft both point out that the fuel cells in their grids that operate on natural fossil gas release at least 80% lower emissions than diesel generators — even those operating by EPA standards. 

Increase in Demand: The Clamor From the Data Center Sector

Data center demands for more power have reached a deafening roar. There’s been a huge call that shows that the same data center sector that was running on 60 megawatts a year now requires ten times that amount. 

Enchanted Rock sees this growth in demand as the inevitable result of a few factors, including how difficult it is to get diesel generator permits and how long the process of getting connected to the grid can be, especially for businesses asking for significant wattage. Offering what the sector demands isn’t easy while sticking to California’s strict rules, but Enchanted Rock is able to meet all of the state’s regulations. 

“Enchanted Rock has always been committed to using the cleanest fuel available without compromising on reliability for our customers,” said the CEO and founder of Enchanted Rock, Thomas McAndrew. 

The company is pleased to be working with U.S. Energy to demonstrate just how renewable natural gas can provide the carbon-neutral results clients want without sacrificing reliable power. 

Enchanted Rock will begin procuring biogas from U.S. Energy for its San Jose microgrid in early 2026.

Read the original article over at Data Center Dynamics.