Geographical impact

Once seen as a centre for data centre excellence, growth and development, Dublin is in a challenging position. A combination of pressure on the national energy grid and ambitious renewable energy targets has effectively halted new data centre connections since 2021.

Whilst the consultation process led by the Commission for the Regulation of Utilities( CRU) is ongoing, what’ s clear is that greater collaboration between government and industry is needed to solve both the data centre, energy and sustainability challenges facing the country.

Similarly in London, a recent report has found that there are up to 400GW of grid requests that may be effectively holding up data centre developments, the strong majority of which( 70 %) may never see approval. The UK National Grid CEO John Pettigrew has said that " bold action " is needed to create a network able to cope with growing demand from AI.

A new approach to energy generation

Despite an apparent similarity of situations, the two geographies are taking very different approaches. In Dublin the constraints on energy availability has led the CRU to propose strict new rules for energy generation, where new facilities connecting to the grid will be required to provide generation and / or storage capacity to match their requested demand.

Additionally, these new distributed energy systems would be required to

participate in the electricity market, improving the resiliency and reliability of the grid, while reporting on their annual consumption of renewable energy and their associated CO 2 emissions.

In the UK, encouraged by the measures set out in the UK Government’ s AI Opportunities Action Plan, operators are beginning to buildout in a host of new locations, including the North of England. In Greater Manchester, for example, Kao Data has been working with local government to bring its £ 350 million facility to life, while Microsoft’ s £ 100 million facility in Leeds brings with it new significant advantages for the Northwest.

In Wales, Vantage’ s multi-billion pound Bridgeport development may also become one of Europe’ s largest data centre campuses and the company plans to invest over £ 12 billion in data centres across the UK – creating over 11,500 jobs in the process.

Many of these facilities are likely to deploy renewable energy sources( RES), while

using innovative energy infrastructure such as battery energy storage systems( BESS), high-density Uninterruptible Power Supplies( UPS) and distributed energy resources to accelerate both their infrastructure deployments, while overcoming energy constraints.

Energy independence

Due to widespread issues of energy constraints, data centre operators are increasingly planning for greater energy independence. Instead of having the ability to operate for just a few hours the event of a power outage, they’ re now looking to technology to enable extended periods of self-sufficiency.

This is supported, in part, by the development of new UPS equipment to provide battery backup and advanced power protection. The latest technologies, for example, feature ultra-compact, pioneering high-density designs, and fault-tolerant architecture that can maximise availability, while delivering up to 99 % energy efficiency.

www. intelligentdatacentres. com 65