New-Tech Europe Magazine | March 2018

Getting the Green from the Grey

Janne Paananen, Eaton EMEA

The world’s data centers consumed 416.2 Terawatt hours of electricity last year. If the estimates are accurate, over the next decade the world’s data centers will consume roughly three times the amount of electricity they do today. From an environmental perspective, that means that data centers are using 3 percent of global energy usage and are responsible for 2 percent of greenhouse gases. So surely, the industry has a responsibility to reduce our combined carbon footprint and get energy usage down? Many data centers are committed to reducing their energy footprint and make the data center as energy efficient as possible, balancing costs as

much as environmental concerns. Our partner Webaxys is a great example of a data center that has a philosophy towards reaching a zero-carbon footprint by reusing old EV batteries. Another good example of recent developments is reuse of data center waste heat; a practice seen more and more, especially in the Nordics. As an industry, we’re helped by the fact energy providers are moving towards renewable energy. Statistics show that in 2017, 24 percent of global electricity is produced by renewables, such as solar, wind and hydro-power. But there’s a crucial element to this conversation that’s often overlooked.

Renewable energy is volatile. That’s not to say it’s going to blow up, but as the energy market moves from fuel-based towards renewable energy, production itself has the potential to become more volatile and harder to both predict and balance electrical supply. Also the amount of inertia, the natural frequency stabilisation mechanism of the grid, is decreasing and therefore resulting greater and faster frequency transients, especially during major faults. The supply of electricity can fluctuate and that instability is no good for data centers, which rely on clean and steady energy supply. With the rise of renewables and rising demand for electricity, it’s more

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