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Google recently released the numbers behind how much energy its data centers consume. It turns out those number crunching mega-centers, one of which is in The Dalles, consume a lot of juice. Like enough to power 100,000 to 200,000 homes, or 260 million watts of continuous power usage.

Despite these staggering figures, Google asserts that using its services is ultimately eco-friendly thanks to widespread measures to increase efficiency and offset its carbon footprint

The search engine giant invested $100 million this past spring in the Shepherds Flat Wind Farm near Arlington to meet its renewable energy goals and offset its carbon emissions. According to a published today, Google says that currently 25 percent of its energy is from renewables and that 30 percent will come from renewables later this year. According to a that Google points to on its , the company’s power usage is about 1 percent of total power consumption by data centers worldwide.

The release of the numbers is the latest in the contest of data-center driven companies like Google and Facebook, which has data center in Prineville, to tout how eco-friendly they are. Google goes so far as to publish a to show others how to be efficient.

Every year, Google saves millions of dollars and avoids emitting tens of thousands of tons of carbon dioxide thanks to our data center sustainability efforts. In fact, our facilities use half the energy of a typical data center.鈥�

Smug? You bet. Are they right? Well, numbers don’t lie.

courtesy of Google.