Enhancing Data Centre Efficiency and Sustainability

Achieving both energy efficiency and scalability has become a critical priority for data centre operators today. It's estimated that up to 50% of energy consumed by data centre systems is wasted due to idle servers and underutilised technology. Efforts to optimise energy consumption are driven not only by the goal of reducing operational costs but also by the increasing importance of sustainability.

We breakdown the following key topics:

1. Current Energy Landscape: Evaluating global energy consumption by data centres, their carbon footprint, and the metrics used to assess energy efficiency.

2. Strategies for Energy Efficiency: Identifying crucial approaches such as hardware optimisation, system virtualisation, energy-efficient software designs, and integrating renewable energy sources.

3. Scalable Solutions: As data centres manage global and regional operations, increasing rack density and AI workloads highlight the importance of scalability.

4. Scaling Efficiently: Using modular designs, edge computing, automation, and AI to expand capacity and streamline operations.

5. Adapting to Future Trends: The importance of adopting cutting-edge technology to improve energy efficiency, particularly as regulations tighten worldwide.

How is Energy Efficiency Measured in Data Centres?

Energy efficiency in data centres is determined by operators’ ability to minimise energy consumption and waste while maintaining smooth operations. Two primary metrics are commonly used to evaluate efficiency across multiple facilities:

Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE): This metric assesses energy efficiency by dividing the total energy entering the data centre by the energy used for IT operations. The goal is to achieve a PUE score as close to 1.0 as possible, although the industry average is typically around 1.55.

Data Centre Infrastructure Efficiency (DCiE): This is the inverse of PUE and is calculated by dividing the energy consumed by IT equipment by the total energy consumed by the facility.

Energy-efficient practices must be scalable, especially for large data centre operators. To achieve this, many rely on energy management systems (EMS) that provide insights into global and local performance, enabling teams to monitor, analyse, and improve energy efficiency across diverse sites and regions.

In today's digital world, energy efficiency is critical, as data centres are continually expanding to meet the growing demand for technological services. The energy required for cooling and maintaining these facilities is significant, which adds to both operational costs and environmental concerns. Regulatory bodies worldwide are increasingly developing standards to ensure greater energy efficiency, making it a priority for operators to future-proof their business strategies.

Current Energy Consumption in Data Centres

As the global energy landscape shifts from fossil fuels toward renewable sources like wind and solar, data centres are emerging as major energy consumers. Data centres account for approximately 1.0% to 1.5% of global energy use, with industrial sectors consuming around 37% of global energy in 2022.

In 2022, data centres consumed between 240 and 340 terawatts of energy, with this figure expected to surge due to the rapid adoption of AI and other high-processing workloads. By 2030, energy consumption in this sector is projected to increase to nearly 3,000 terawatts.

With data centres responsible for around 1% of global greenhouse gas emissions, operators must work to significantly reduce their carbon footprint—targeting a 50% reduction to meet the Net-Zero Emissions Scenario by 2050. Many operators are proactively adopting energy-efficient strategies to stay ahead of upcoming regulations, focusing on renewable energy integration, hardware optimisation, and system virtualisation.

Key Components of Data Centre Energy Efficiency

Leading data centres are implementing several strategies to reduce their Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) scores. These include optimising hardware, upgrading cooling solutions, and improving airflow management. Common approaches include:

Optimising Hardware and Cooling Systems: As servers are responsible for over half of energy consumption in data centres, updating to energy-efficient servers can lead to significant reductions. By adopting newer technology, increasing processor utilization, and running larger workloads, operators can drastically cut energy use.

Hybrid Cooling Solutions: While many centres use air-cooling systems, hybrid air-liquid cooling solutions are becoming more popular for cooling AI and other high-performance systems. Liquid cooling can be up to 1,000 times more efficient than air cooling, though the cost and complexity of these systems mean they are typically deployed selectively.

Harnessing Virtualisation and Energy-Aware Software Design

Virtualization can play a key role in reducing energy consumption. Servers often run at less than full capacity, leading to wasted energy. By virtualising infrastructure, including servers, storage, and networks, operators can consolidate workloads onto fewer servers, thus reducing the number of machines that require power and cooling.

Containers are also an efficient solution, as they only run essential application functions, requiring fewer resources. Additionally, energy-aware software design—where teams optimise software for minimal energy use - can result in a 30-90% reduction in consumption.

Integrating Renewable Energy

Data centres are increasingly incorporating renewable energy sources such as solar and wind into their operations. To overcome intermittency issues, operators are deploying microgrids and battery energy storage systems (BESS), which can store renewable energy and act as backup power. These systems are often paired with energy management systems (EMS) for efficient energy deployment.

Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) offer another option for increasing the use of renewable energy. PPAs allow data centre operators to secure renewable energy, either onsite or offsite, through partnerships with third-party providers.

Not all PPA's are power matched, with facilties still potentially being powered from non-renewable sources from a respective grid. It is therefore important that Virtual Purchase Power Agreements (VPPA's) are procured, which provide matched energy sources in the agreement.

Solutions for Scalable, Energy-Efficient Data Centres

Traditionally, expanding data centre capacity was a time-consuming process. However, the adoption of prefabricated modular data centres (PFMs) allows operators to rapidly scale operations. PFMs are pre-assembled offsite and can be quickly deployed in response to business needs.

Edge computing is also becoming critical for meeting the low-latency demands of applications like telehealth, smart manufacturing, and media streaming. PFMs help standardise these deployments, providing flexibility and scalability for operators.

Leveraging Automation and AI for Resource Management

Automation and artificial intelligence (AI) are becoming indispensable tools in resource management. With AI, operators can predict server workloads, optimise power and cooling requirements, and even anticipate outages, ensuring a seamless switch to backup power when needed.

Digital twin technology, combined with AI and machine learning, allows data centre teams to simulate processes and make real-time improvements, further enhancing energy efficiency.

Adapting to Market Trends and Regulations

Governments worldwide are introducing regulations aimed at improving data centre energy efficiency. For instance, the European Union’s Energy Efficiency Directive mandates that data centres create energy management plans and report on their operations.

Forward-thinking data centres are already adopting cloud computing, automation, AI, and next-generation energy systems to stay ahead of these regulations. They also utilise IT asset management tools to track and optimise assets, ensuring efficient use of hardware and reducing licensing costs.

Future-Proofing Data Centre Operations for Energy Efficiency and Scalability

In conclusion, data centre operators have numerous strategies at their disposal to enhance energy efficiency and scalability. By leveraging a combination of advanced hardware, cooling systems, renewable energy, automation, and AI, these facilities can significantly reduce operational costs while lowering their environmental impact.

Consultation, regulation and AI as an enabler and accelerator

AI can be an enabler and accelerator of the transition to a circular economy, where AI technologies can be applied to three key aspects of a circular economy: design circular products, components and materials, operate circular business models and optimise infrastructure, to ensure circular flows of products and materials.

Creating greater awareness and understanding of how AI can support a circular economy is essential to encourage applications in design, business models, and infrastructure.

At BSI, we supply AI technology solutions and offer options for hosting systems in sustainable 100% renewable powered data centres.