Greenpeaces Unfriend

Coal Campaign and

Facebook
Case Analysis
Written Analysis and Communication
Individual Assignment 1
Submitted to Prof. Swatantra
Muraledharan R (2012PGP213)
3/4/2013

A Report on

LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL

March 3, 2013
Prof. Swatantra,
Department of Communication,
Indian Institute of Management Indore,
Indore -453331.
Respected Maam,
Subject: Submission of Report on Greenpeaces Unfriend Coal Campaign and
Facebook
As per the guidelines provided by you during the classroom discussion, I hereby submit
a report on the case titled Greenpeaces Unfriend Coal Campaign and Facebook.This
report has been prepared after going through the entire case and carefully scrutinizing
the facts and assumptions. The report contains the relevant facts in the introduction,
problem statement and list of possible alternative and best action plan to be
implemented.
Kindly evaluate the same and provide your valuable inputs.
Regards,
Muraleedharan R
Roll No: 2012PGP213
PGP-1, Section A,
Indian Institute of Management Indore
Indore 453331
Email: p12muraleedharan@iimidr.ac.in

Executive Summary
This report analyses the case Greenpeaces Unfriend Coal Campaign and
Facebook Facebook announced opening a new data center facility in Prineville,
Oregon, on January 21, 2010. The designing of this new data center will be energyefficient and produce renewable power resources in order to support the business
environment. However, Greenpeace, a non-governmental organization to protect
environment, is against the construction of Facebooks new data center, located in
Prineville, as the energy provider to the new data center sources over 60% of its
energy by burning coal, which would increase environmental pollution and
launched an online animated YouTube video that publicly critiqued the
environmental sustainability of Facebooks decision for electricity supply.
Greenpeace suggests Facebook to drop the level of electricity usages from burning
coal, and to use renewable energy instead, cutting its carbon footprint and helping
to prevent catastrophic climate change.

Table of Contents
Page no
1. Introduction

2. Problem Statement

3. Analysis
i) Assumptions

ii) Alternatives and their Evaluation

4. Recommendations

5. References

1. Introduction
Facebook is a USA based social networking site founded by Mark
Zuckerburg. After experiencing rapid expansion of operations, so did the financial
feasibility for the company, Facebook decided to execute the option of building its
own large, data center facility in Prineville, Oregon, after considering various
factors including availability of renewable power resources. This decision created
excitement in Prineville as the Facebook data center provided a new opportunity
for development of economically instable Prineville.
But Greenpeace, non-profit organization, launched a social media campaign
in Feb 2010 to protest the decision as they saw this as a small concession upon
discovering that the electricity used to power the data center operations would be
from PacifiCorp, a utility provider who sourced over 60 percent of its energy from
burning coal, one of the largest contributors to global warming, concerning
environmental safety.
Greenpeaces director KumiNaidoo sent a letter to Zuckerburg, which was
posted in Facebook,urging him to address climate change and also inviting him to
discuss and reach a common ground. Facebooks director of Policy
Communications, Barry Schnitt responded to this through a blog post citing that
Facebook had no control over its source of electricity and that Greenpeaces power
provider itself sourced 46% of its power from coal. Following this, Greenpeace
escalated the issue by a cynical video that taunted Zuckerburg and aired the onus
his firm has in adopting cleaner sources of energy.
2. Problem Statement
How Facebook would publically respond to mounting pressure from
Greenpeace? Would Facebook continue with its construction of new Prineville
data center without minding Greenpeaces protest? Would it take the advice of
Greenpeace and shift to pollution free power sourcing to set an environmental
example for the rest? considering the development of Prineville in both aspects.

3. Analysis
3.1 Assumptions

ASSUMPTIONS BY FACEBOOK
Facebook assumed that the campaign would die its natural death and so planned
to double capacity at the Prineville data center in future
Schnitt assumes that use of cleaner energy is not feasible for a company as large
as Facebook and supports the same with the fact that Greenpeace itself uses
coal-based electricity for its few data servers.
Schnitt believed that blogging about Facebooks position and Greenpeace not
offering any solutions would silence the campaign. However, Greenpeace
launches a much stronger campaign following this.
ASSUMPTIONS BY GREENPEACE
Greenpeace makes a big assumption that companies with big brands and
purchasing power must necessarily go for cleaner energy sources
Growth rates decrease over a period of time but Greenpeace uses Facebooks
current growth rate to predict its energy usage for the year 2020. This could
lead to results much greater than the original value
A campaign must stick to the problem at hand. Greenpeace believes that a
campaign is more impactful if it could taunt the founder of the organization

3.2 Alternatives and their Evaluations

1. Considering the fact that Greenpeace has enough knowledge in cleaner
energy sources they may be able to suggest better options for Facebook.
Facebook could invite Greenpeace for a discussion that could help Facebook
explore alternative options that might support Facebooks energy needs and
expansion plans. This could signal Facebooks interest to reach a common
ground. As the invitation is public, if Greenpeace is not willing for
discussion this would show them in bad light. Though Greenpeace suggests
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an alternative power source there is no guarantee that it would be energy

efficient and within the financial feasibility also need to consider the
development of Prineville location
2. Let Facebook continues with its current plan of constructing Data Center as
designed and later on increase energy efficiency in all offices and move
towards green buildings. This move should be complemented by greater
advertising that Facebook cares for the environment and saves energy
wherever possible and also gradually shifts the power source from coal to
wind power which is efficient. This could show Facebooks concern for the
green environment and could be a lot cheaper
3. Facebook can launch a campaign against Greenpeace and declare its
campaign is pointless stating that it planned to use coal based power sources
due to lack of or huge cost involved in green power sources pointing that
even Greenpeace uses coal for 46% of its power requirements. This could
reduce the negative publicity.
4. Recommendations
It is debatable if Facebook erred by going for coal based electricity;
however, campaigning against Greenpeace or ignoring its complaints is
definitely not a constructive solution for the problem. Moving to greener energy
need not happen overnight, this may done at phases firstly increasing the energy
efficiencies and plan could be set as that a suitable mix of green energy would
be used this year. Facebook can team with other datacenter intensive
companies like Google, IBM and could take their concerns regarding viable
clean energy sources.
5. References

www.greenpeace.org (blog 41619)

www.guardian.co.uk
Inhabitat.com/facebook teamup with Greenpeace to kick coal power/
/www.facebook.com/unfriendcoal/
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