There’s no denying that data centres are responsible for a high percentage of the world’s power consumption and CO2 emissions.

Current ICT energy consumption rivals that of the aviation industry and, with the growth of cloud computing and remote working technologies, the contribution by data centres is only set to rise. But there is good news as well, since plans are now emerging from all around the world to re-use the waste heat and CO2 emitted from these facilities.

Temperatures in many data centres, which range between 27 and 46 degrees Celsius, remain quite low for some heat recovery strategies, but more and more projects are now looking to innovate to reduce waste. So join us on a whistle-stop world tour of environmentally-friendly data centre projects in the making...

Canada

The media company Quebecor has its premises in Winnipeg, where the average low temperature in January is minus 23 degrees Celsius. Yet this firm was spending money to mechanically cool its data centre and then paying out again to heat the rest of the building. Now the business channels excess heat produced by servers at its data centre into the editorial offices which are located directly upstairs.

Holland

Parthenon Data Centres is a Dutch company which designs, builds and operates carbon neutral data centres energetically coupled with greenhouse farming. The developer is now looking for an anchor tenant and reports that the project has spurred a great deal of interest among major IT suppliers, including IBM.

France

In Paris, scientists are using heat from the Condorcet data centre to recreate the climatic conditions expected to prevail in France in 2050. This project is now growing and researching plants with the aim of identifying the species most adaptable to climatic changes.

Switzerland

The Uitikon centre in Switzerland is being used to heat a nearby swimming pool. Hot air generated by this recently built IBM data centre is being funnelled next door to warm water that will be pumped into the local bathes.

United Kingdom

Excess heat from servers at the new Telehouse West data centre is expected to produce up to nine megawatts of power for the local London Dockland community and will soon be utilised in nearby houses and businesses.

Finland

Waste heat from a Finnish data centre situated below Uspenski Cathedral will warm the water that runs in pipes to up to 500 nearby homes, which is the equivalent to the power generated by a large wind turbine.

New York

A data centre built by IBM and Syracuse University in New York state uses gas-powered microturbines to generate on-site power. During the winter, the 307 degree Celsius exhaust from the microturbines is directed through heat exchangers to produce hot water, which is then piped to a nearby office building to be re-used in the building’s heating system.