Solar power: Google pulls the plug

Solar power was at heart of Google's alternative energy efforts. But CEO Page has dropped the solar power and other energy projects to refocus Google on the Internet.

Google Inc has abandoned an ambitious project to make renewable energy cheaper than coal, the latest target of Chief Executive Larry Page's moves to focus the Internet giant on fewer efforts.

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Google said on Tuesday that it was pulling the plug on seven projects, including Renewable Energy Cheaper than Coal as well as a Wikipedia-like online encyclopedia service known as Knol.

The plans, which Google announced on its corporate blog, represent the third so-called ``spring cleaning'' announcement that Google has made since Google co-founder Page took the reins in April.

The changes come as Google is facing stiff competition in mobile computing and social networking from Apple Inc and Facebook, and as some investors have groused about rising spending at the world's No.1 Internet search company.

``To recap, we're in the process of shutting down a number of products which haven't had the impact we'd hoped for, integrating others as features into our broader product efforts, and ending several which have shown us a different path forward,'' wrote Google Senior Vice President of Operations Urs Holzle in the blog post.

Google said that it believed other institutions were better positioned to take its renewable energy efforts ``to the next level.''

Google began making investments and doing research into technology to drive down the price of renewable energy in 2007, with a particular focus on solar power technology.

In 2009, the company's so-called Green Energy Czar, Bill Weihl, told Reuters that he expected to demonstrate within a few years working technology that could produce renewable energy at a cheaper price than coal.

``It is even odds, more or less,'' Weihl said at the time. ``In three years, we could have multiple megawatts of plants out there.''

A Google spokesman said that Weihl had left Google earlier this month.

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