Key concepts#

The Green Web Foundation offers an API to provide any IP address or domain, and get back a ‘green’ result indicating that the site or digital service appears to be running on digital powered by green energy, and we have found evidence to support this claim or a ‘grey’ result where no evidence was found for green energy.

Where the providers of service have provided information into the public domain, we make links to this supporting evidence, as well as further information describing the kind of service it is.

What green energy means in this context#

We explain what green energy means in more detail on the main green web foundation website, as well as the myriad ways to provide evidence but the short version is as follows:

If you want a green site, you need to demonstrate steps you are taking to avoid, reduce or offset the greenhouse gas emissions caused using electricity to provide the service. You need to do this on a yearly basis, or better.

This means, that ideally, for any domain or IP address that shows as green, we can demonstrate:

  1. a link to a hosting provider who have been able to share evidence where they have accounted for the carbon emissions from the electricity used by their service

  2. a link to a hosting provider who is using a using a datacenter provider who themselves are able to make similar claims for their power usage.

Every time a domain or IP address is checked, the system logs when it was checked, and what the result was. Over time this makes it possible to track the transition of websites and digital services to using green energy.

For more details, please see understanding checks for green websites