EDITOR ’ S QUESTION

his month ’ s news that

Vertiv has unveiled the Vertiv EnerSav initiative reinforces the case for future data centres being built to ecologically sustainable standards .

When a specialist global operator like Vertiv gets it , the debate doesn ’ t hedge bets .

Now , surely , it ’ s only a matter of how .

The Vertiv service , available throughout Asia , Australia and New Zealand , is about data centre optimisation – essentially identifying cost saving opportunities by reducing energy consumption without the need for a major infrastructure overhaul .

But the mindset is moving towards building new centres to be defined by their ecological sustainability .

As one of the world ’ s largest data centre hubs , Singapore , for instance , has been warned by one of its biggest business players that it could lose future demand to regional economies unless it expands its capacity for new centres in an environmentally friendly way .

Singapore ended a three-year pause on new data centre projects last year and called for applications to build new facilities with higher green standards .

Despite its limited land size , Singapore ranks among the most desirable data centre locations , tying with Silicon Valley for second place globally and ranking first in Asia , according to a study by Cushman & Wakefield , a real estate services company .

Singapore ’ s challenges prove particularly acute where year-round high temperatures and humidity require more energy to cool the stacks of servers . With over 70 facilities , data centres consume more than 7 % of the city-state ’ s total electricity .

Among the conditions for new applications , total allocated capacity is capped at 60 MW per year , which is much lower than the industry ’ s demand .

And Singapore still accounts for some 60 % of South-East Asia ’ s total data centre capacity .

The global asset manager , Keppel , headquartered in Singapore , wants authorities to raise the capacity to at least 1 GW in order to meet growing demand from big tech .

Keppel ’ s key proposal is to build a data centre development called Datapark +, which seeks to use spare shipping docks and operate on a green energy grid using hydrogen , which burns without emitting carbon dioxide .

Keppel claims the park will have more data centre capacity than has been constructed in Singapore over the past decade .

In this , Keppel sets a strong example for the way forward .

The corporation is also developing new data centres with higher energy efficiency and planning to export them to other major data centre hubs .

One example is the floating data centre that would both save energy and get past Singapore ’ s geographical constraints .

Keppel partnered with Australia ’ s transport and logistics provider , Toll Group , in 2020 to study the feasibility of the floating data centre .

The facility will be constructed on an offshore platform and use sea water to cool servers , cutting energy needs .

And approval has been acquired for the construction of a floating data centre which , now at the final design stage , will also be part of the Datapark + project in the future .

Pushing its message wider , Keppel is looking over the next two years at other cities for its data centre business . India , Japan and South Korea are leading candidates with strong demand from big tech . www . intelligentdatacentres . com

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