The Green Data Center (GDC) is a concept that many data centers worldwide are implementing. The concept is to build environmentally friendly and sustainable facilities while also providing high-quality services to the customers. In this article, we would like to showcase some green data center examples.
Some Interesting Green Data Center Examples
The world’s most advanced green data centers are being built by Google, Microsoft, Apple, and Facebook. These companies have much money to spend on their data centers, but they also have an incentive to be as energy efficient as possible.
If they can reduce their energy usage and carbon footprint, they’ll save money on operating costs and gain public support for their business model.
Google’s Project Sunroof
Google’s Project Sunroof uses satellite imagery and machine learning to calculate how much power a solar panel system will generate at any given home and how much money it will save over time.
The project was launched in 2016. The purpose is to help people understand what solar panels cost and if they are worth investing in them or not.
The Project Sunroof has proven itself as an excellent tool for educating customers about solar energy and its benefits. It has also helped many people who were on the fence about installing solar panels make up their minds about going green!
Google’s new data center in Hamina, Finland, is a shining example of a green data center. The facility features many environmentally friendly features, such as an on-site wind farm, which supplies up to 20 percent of its power needs; seawater used for cooling; and an advanced wastewater treatment system that eliminates 99 percent of wastewater before it leaves the site.
The Server of Microsoft
The Server of Microsoft Wyoming is a hydroelectric power plant located in the Laramie River Canyon, just outside the town of Cheyenne. The plant has a capacity of 2 megawatts and generates enough electricity to power about 1,200 homes each year.
The dam is located at river mile 453 (river miles are measured from the mouth of the river), just upstream from where the Laramie meets up with the North Platte River.
The powerhouse is located on private property just below the dam, while the tailrace runs along Highway 80 before entering into an underground culvert that carries it under Highway 80 and Interstate 25 before pooling into the South Platte River just north of Denver Avenue.
The power source for CLP is the nearby Shoshone Hydroelectric Plant, which generates water from the Snake River Canyon Dam on an annual basis that is equivalent to $13 million worth of electricity produced by coal-fired power plants at $0.06 per kWh compared to $0.05 per kWh produced by coal-fired power plants.
Because Microsoft uses only renewable energy sources for its operations, so it can offer competitive pricing options compared to other cloud providers still dependent on fossil fuels or nuclear energy sources that may be more expensive than renewable options like hydroelectricity.
Microsoft has been using its software to analyze energy consumption at its data center in Quincy, Washington. This analysis has led Microsoft to make several improvements in its cooling systems and other areas at this facility, resulting in a 35 percent decrease in energy usage compared with its original projections.
Apple Computer Inc. Server Farm
Apple has a massive data center in Maiden, North Carolina, which is slightly different from the others. This farm is located in Maiden, North Carolina, which is famous for its water-based cooling system and efficiently uses its energy source.
Apple has invested $1 billion in this data center, one of the world’s largest. The company uses these servers to store photos, videos, and other types of data that can be accessed through their services like iTunes, iCloud, iMessage, etc.
Apple has been working hard to make its products more eco-friendly and less harmful to nature. They have developed this new server farm to help them fulfill their goals.
The new Apple Server Farm will take care of its power needs using solar panels covering an area of about 10 acres at its Maiden location. The company has also installed a water-cooling system that uses cold water from Lake Norman to keep its servers cool without electricity or an air conditioning unit.
Furthermore, Apple uses solar panels at its North Carolina data center that generates more than enough energy to power the entire facility during peak hours on sunny days.
The new data center will be powered by a 20MW solar installation with another 30MW on standby when needed. The solar array comprises more than 7,000 panels that can generate up to 50MW of electricity per hour at total capacity.
Facebook Company Data Center
This data center is located in Oregon and uses wind energy as its power source. Facebook has been working with local utility PacifiCorp to develop a wind farm that will provide 100% of the power for the new facility.
The wind farm has 17 turbines and is expected to generate 200 megawatts of power, enough to supply more than 50,000 homes.
The company has designed a new type of data center that it claims uses 30 percent less power than traditional facilities. It’s called a “cold aisle containment system,” It keeps water-cooled air from mixing with hot air from servers.
The new design is part of Facebook’s Open Compute Project, which aims to make its technology available for anyone to use — even competitors like Google and Apple. The project includes designs for servers, storage systems, and network gear that can lower costs by order of magnitude compared to traditional methods.
It is architecturally designed to be energy-efficient, using 73% less energy than the industry average with outside air economization and an innovative water-cooling system.
The environment has been considered at every step of the process, and Facebook has gone further by using LED lighting, which requires 70% less energy than fluorescent lighting.
Facebook Company Data Center has been certified LEED Platinum by US Green Building Council. It is one of the most significant green buildings in the world.
A green data center is more sustainable than a traditional DC
Green data centers are the way of the future. As more and more data centers switch to greener tactics, we will see a better world for it. Everyone involved is responsible for making this change to do so in the most efficient manner possible.
Most data centers are powered by electricity, which creates a significant amount of waste heat in the form of unused energy.
This waste heat is wasted and expensive because it requires cooling systems to keep it from overheating the facility.
Green data centers increase their efficiency by reducing the amount of energy needed to cool their facilities and using alternative energy sources such as solar power and wind turbines.
Continue read on: More IT Leaders Prioritizing Green Data Centers
The green data center is a business buy-in to the concept that data centers should be run efficiently and with as little impact on the environment as possible. This means that the physical building should not use more power than necessary, and the IT equipment inside it should be energy efficient.
There are also ways that we can reduce the carbon footprint through data center operations. These include:
- Reducing power consumption by optimizing cooling systems and other equipment
- Using renewable energy sources such as solar or wind power
- Implementing policies to reduce water consumption
Many have turned to green data centers as businesses look for ways to become eco-friendly and sustainable.
Conclusion
Green data centers are often confused with IT’s cloud computing system. IT’s cloud computing is a network of computers that can be accessed remotely.
The Green data center is also a network of servers used for saving and managing data. But there are many more ways to green the data center and reduce its power consumption.
Learning from the data center examples above, we can choose the most suitable solution to implement. Meanwhile, the target for reducing carbon emissions in 2025 is to decrease by 50%.
Indonesia is rich in natural gas, and if this can be distributed to the data center industry, the target for reducing the carbon footprint of data centers in Indonesia can decrease by up to 50%.
Therefore, we hope that the Indonesian government will consider this matter through several relevant agencies. Hopefully, the data center in Indonesia will be greener, more efficient, and more reliable.
Our choice to build a green data center is not just a moral decision. It is a practical, sustainable solution that can allow your company to grow without the harmful energy consumption of traditional data centers.
As we work closer on a green data center planning with some experts and the Association of Indonesian Data Center Operators (IDPRO), keep following our journey to gain a more meaningful understanding of data center efficiency and environmental impact.
Sharing information and knowledge is how we can make these changes, and considering your options is how you will make them work for you.