While you might have looked up Apple's iPhone-salvaging robot 'Liam' with a cynical eye the one thing you can't deny is that the tech giant is making enormous strides in the use of renewable energy.
The company is so proficient at creating clean energy in fact that it has had to form a brand-new company just so it can start selling some of it off back into the national grid.
According to 9to5Mac, Apple has created Apple Energy to start selling the excess solar energy that its farms in Cupertino and Nevada were creating.
This is a long term decision too, as Apple moves to become 100 per cent powered by renewable energy it's going to need to find a way of either storing that energy up for when it needs it most, or offsetting its excess.
While energy storage remains in the very early developmental stage it makes sense for Apple to sell off any excess and then buy net-metered energy during the evening or cloudy days.
Apple’s supply chain is arguably its most energy-intensive link in the chain.
According to the WSJ it uses 60 times more energy than any other part of the business.
To combat this, Apple has announced that it will partner with a Chinese energy company to build two massive 20-megawatt solar farms. Producing 80 million kilowatt hours per year of clean energy the solar farms will provide far more energy than is needed to power all of Apple’s corporate offices and retail stores in China.
Apple’s CEO Tim Cook confirmed that the process would take “years” but that “it’s important work that has to happen, and Apple is in a unique position to take the initiative toward this ambitious goal. It is a responsibility we accept.”