Dell goes green by making all its facilities worldwide carbon neutral, meeting its biggest and latest environmental goal as pledged earlier to do so by the end of 2008.

BEIJING, Aug. 7 (Xinhuanet) -- Dell goes green by making all its facilities worldwide carbon neutral, meeting its biggest and latest environmental goal as pledged earlier to do so by the end of 2008, according to media report on Thursday.

The world's No. 2. maker of personal computers switched to "green" energy produced from renewable resources, cutting back on electricityconsumption and buying carbon "offsets" such as portions of a forest in Madagascar.

Dell announced it is also making additional investments in wind power in the United States, China and India. It is partnering with Conservation International to protect more than 591,000 acres of habitat in Madagascar.

It's saving more than 3 million dollars yearly and has avoided nearly 20,000 tons of carbon dioxide going up into the atmosphere through improvements at its plants and other offices and through a global power-management effort, it added.

Dell isn't the first company to declare its operations carbon neutral, but is the first global high-tech player to do so.

"They do deserve some congratulations," said Stephen Stokes, a climate change and business analyst for AMR Research, noting that the company took steps beyond just buying energy credits,. "Even if you were the worst carbon emitter in the world, if you wrote a huge check ... you could claim to be carbon neutral."