Google Inc. and units of trading houses Itochu Corp. and Sumitomo Corp. have agreed to invest $500 million to become part owners of a $2 billion wind farm under construction in Oregon.
Tyr Energy and Sumitomo Corp. of America are the divisions that will invest with Google, Masahiro Okafuji, chief executive officer of Tokyo-based Itochu, said in a statement Tuesday. Sumitomo will invest about $200 million, spokesman Tsuyoshi Asada said.
Google is investing $100 million of the total, according to a blog posting from the Mountain View, Calif.-based company, which said the project was attractive because of its size and scale and because it will use advanced technology from General Electric Co. The deal was first announced Monday by Fairfield, Conn.-based GE, which is providing 338 turbines for the 845-megawatt wind farm that will have the capacity to power more than 235,000 homes. Terms of the transaction weren't disclosed.