ESG and Data center sustainability

Today, with the increasingly vigorous digital economy, data centers and digital infrastructure are growing exponentially, and their energy consumption and environmental impact are also rising. A series of policies, regulations, customer and investor demands, and a growing recognition that sustainability is closely related to enterprise growth expectations are driving data centers towards sustainable development. There is an urgent need for data center stakeholders to plan ahead and think about low-carbon and sustainable development issues. In a recent survey of more than 800 global hosting companies conducted by Schneider Electric and 451 Research, 97% of respondents said their customers demand sustainability commitments in their business partnerships.

Recent survey results show that while most companies and organizations have increased their emphasis on ESG reporting, practice has lagged behind. At the same time, the Uptime Institute survey found that most organizations aren’t paying close attention to their ecological footprints. To better support data center operators and empower the industry to achieve its own sustainability goals, Schneider Electric has created the first indicator framework for measuring environmental sustainability in data centers.

The framework includes five key elements of energy, water, greenhouse gas emissions, waste, land and biodiversity, and is refined into 23 key indicators under different sustainability frameworks. It applies to data center operators at different stages of sustainable development, such as primary, advanced and industry-leading. To help the industry measure and report on the environmental impact of data centers in a standardized way.

Key index

Energy, as one of the largest operating costs of data centers, is the primary category that needs to be monitored and measured, while the output of fossil fuels and renewable energy is geographically affected, and its price fluctuates greatly. Maximizing energy efficiency therefore makes business and long-term environmental sense.

Second, greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon emissions from CO2 (carbon dioxide), CH4 (methane), PFCS (perfluorides) and HFCS (hydrofluorocarbons) are major contributors to climate change and actions and efforts should be undertaken in all areas of operations to reduce such emissions. For example, SF6, a greenhouse gas widely found in medium-voltage switchgear, is 23,000 times more potent than an equivalent amount of CO2. Therefore, Schneider Electric has developed and launched sulfur hexafluoride free products to effectively solve the above problems.

Water use is also a big focus, with a 15MW data center consuming up to 360,000 gallons (1,363 tons) of water per day. Cooling towers and other evaporative cooling technologies are popular because of their high efficiency and powerful cooling capacity, but evaporative cooling also requires large amounts of water. Typically, a 1MW data centre using conventional evaporative cooling uses 25m litres of water a year.

In addition, data centers inevitably generate a variety of waste during the construction and operation phase, often including hazardous materials that must be properly disposed of. Circular economy design methodologies, Green Premium™ technology and better processes can improve data center sustainability, as can end-of-life recycling such as uninterruptible power (UPS) batteries. Potential damage to land and biodiversity during the data center construction phase must be kept to a minimum. In particular, higher demands must be placed on projects and developers. Sustainability is not only about the data center facilities themselves, but also about supporting renewable energy infrastructure such as solar panels and wind turbines.

When any one of these indicators is selected, the results that drive significant improvements in sustainability should be practical and as applicable to all regions as possible.

Energy consumption index

Energy-related matters, for example, are handled on the premise that data center operators measure their facilities’ total energy consumption, PUEs and share of renewable energy use. Renewable energy can be acquired locally, by purchasing renewable energy indicators from energy companies, or by signing long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs).

According to the measurement results, the REF renewable energy coefficient can be calculated, which reflects the proportion of renewable energy in all energy consumption of a site. A REF of 1 means the entire data center uses renewable energy. Another key indicator is the energy reuse factor (ERF), which is defined in standard ISO/IEC 30134-6. Based on the combination of indicators, data center operators can be incentivize to improve overall energy efficiency, increase the use of renewable energy, and promote the development of a circular economy through initiatives such as recycling waste heat.

Greenhouse gas index

On a global scale, it is important to control carbon emissions. Many internationally agreed agreements contain complex calculations that include carbon emissions from multiple sources and form the basis for other measures such as carbon intensity and carbon use efficiency (CUE). Related to IT load, CUE can enable data centers or other industries to compare carbon emissions in such a way that it can be useful in site selection, planning and design, and operational phases to measure continuous improvement.

Carbon offsets and carbon credits can be purchased by enterprises to offset the carbon emissions generated, thus encouraging enterprises to achieve carbon reduction from more dimensions. In addition, the match between supply and consumption per hour will be used to measure the operator’s renewable energy generation and consumption.