D A T A C E N T R E P R E D I C T I O N S
Jonathan Blake , VP and Director , TMT EMEA , HDR
Infrastructure investment outside of the data centre site is therefore key to allowing local communities to benefit from this source of energy .
As an example , our team partnered with Swansea Council , DST Innovations and Batri on the delivery of the largescale green energy and transport hub and port development in Swansea . The project brings together eco-homes with a tidal lagoon ( producing tidal energy ), solar farm , battery manufacturing plant ( storing power generated on-site ) and hyperscale data centre , whose waste heat can be integrated into a new local district heating system .
Size and location changes supporting the circular economy , by exploring how facilities are built and how they can be effectively dismantled and adapted going forward .
On-site energy and backup power
The demand for more data centre space and capacity is far exceeding the existing grid capacities in many European countries . In certain locations , therefore , attention is shifting to onsite power generation initially from ‘ transitional ’ fuels such a natural gas .
However , the hope , eventually , is that this will transition to ‘ green ’ hydrogen supplemented by ever increasing capacities from renewables with the potential for greater battery storage to provide continuity .
Reusing waste heat from data centres is another key consideration . Air-cooled data centres do not produce good quality waste heat so , again , as more data centres inevitably transition to closed loop liquid cooling this brings advantages for the use of high-grade waste heat .
As AI data centres come into their own , this will influence locations . While cloud services need to be near large urban areas for latency reasons , there is currently no such concern with AI , so these data centres can potentially be built in areas where the climate is more favourable , or where there is more land and power availability . This will kick-start a move away from urban locations and companies will explore locations that have not been considered previously .
Interestingly , looking even further ahead , this trend may well reverse once more as growing technologies like autonomous vehicles will mean that more Edge-type data centre hubs will be needed closer to urban environments to ensure strong connectivity . Moreover , due to land shortages and high costs , we will see more multi-storey centres that maximise available space . �
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