Former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency chief Lisa Jackson has been hired by Apple (AAPL) as vice president of environmental initiatives.
Apple CEO Tim Cook announced the news Tuesday at the All Things D tech conference in Rancho Palos Verdes.
“I’m incredibly impressed with Apple’s commitment to the environment and I’m thrilled to be joining the team,” Jackson said in a statement released by Apple. “Apple has shown how innovation can drive real progress by removing toxics from its products, incorporating renewable energy in its data center plans and continually raising the bar for energy efficiency in the electronics industry. I look forward to helping support and promote these efforts, as well as leading new ones in the future aimed at protecting the environment.”
The high-profile hire was welcomed by environmental organizations such as Greenpeace, which has organized protests at Apple stores to pressure the tech titan to use more renewable forms of energy and clean up the manufacturing practices of its supply chain.
“Apple has made a bold move in hiring Lisa Jackson, a proven advocate with a track record of combating toxic waste and the dirty energy that causes global warming, two of Apple’s biggest challenges as it continues to grow,” Greenpeace senior IT analyst Gary Cook said in a statement. “Jackson can make Apple the top environmental leader in the tech sector by helping the company use its influence to push electric utilities and governments to provide the clean energy that both Apple and America need right now.”
Apple, Facebook and Google (GOOG) have enormous data centers within 45 minutes of one another in western North Carolina, as well as elsewhere around the world. The region, which used to be a center of textile and furniture manufacturing, now pitches itself as North Carolina’s “Data Center Corridor.” Power for the three data centers comes from Duke Energy, which offers some of the cheapest electricity in the nation, but most of Duke’s electricity comes from coal-fired power plants.
Apple’s 100-acre, 500,000-square-foot data center in Maiden, N.C., is the region’s largest, and Apple has committed to using renewable energy at the facility. San Jose-based SunPower (SPWRA) will provide solar panels for the new data center, while Sunnyvale-based Bloom Energy will provide fuel cells.
Jackson, a chemical engineer and the first African-American to hold the top EPA job, announced in December that she was leaving the agency where she had worked, off and on, for 25 years.
Contact Dana Hull at 408-920-2706. Follow her at Twitter.com/danahull.