Collaboration to transformation: Reducing carbon impact in data center design

30 September 2024

By Rachel Personius, U.S. head of sustainability and Mark Wartenberg, sustainability advisor, Currie & Brown

Last week, we brought an important question to NYC Climate Week: “Can we solve the critical sustainability questions surrounding the future of data centers?” This question is central to our future; socially, economically and environmentally. We believe the industry must rethink data center design and construction. But we understand that this can’t be a blind leap of faith. The industry needs some certainty that any changes they make are going to deliver what they need. Those are the answers we seek to bring.

Data centers have become the foundation upon which modern life is built. Every email, every streamed movie, every internet search; all rely on data centers. The AI boom is now dramatically accelerating demand, and supply is struggling to keep pace.

Data center construction is not sustainable. Data centers’ power demand, already an eyewatering 2% share of global energy consumption, is projected to more than double by 2030, according to the Electric Power Research Institute.

The huge amount of embodied carbon generated by data centers across their lifecycle poses a major challenge that so far remains unsolved as the average data center generates up to 4500 mtCO2e per MW (estimated), which is equivalent to burning up to 495,000 gallons of gas for every MW. We estimate that the embodied carbon associated with construction of new data centers could reach 88 million tonnes CO2e by 2030, while the heat wasted from existing centers could meet the needs of over 13 million homes.

So, what can be done?

Clearly, significant change is required. The industry will need to ask challenging questions and be prepared to invest, test and collaborate to get workable, sustainable answers. As part of that, the industry must be open to real and lasting change, and fully understand the practical implications: Will it truly reduce the environmental impact? What will be the cost implications? What will be the impact on the scale, scope, feasibility or speed of project delivery? We aim to provide the certainty the industry needs to embrace new ideas that could transform the way data centers are designed, built and operated.

Our recent report, Decarbonizing the backbone of the internet, outlined the five major pillars we believe will be central to rapidly decarbonizing data centers:

• Waste heat recapture: 99% of datacenter energy is currently lost as waste heat
• Adaptive reuse: up to 78% reduction in embodied carbon compared to new build – what is possible for data centers? (ZGF Architects, n.d)
• Lowest carbon construction materials: We estimate up to 20% reduction in embodied carbon using available technology
• Clean energy produced and used on site
• Re-imagined, comprehensive data-centric metrics: providing greater transparency for investors, consumers and planning bodies.

We’re now asking the difficult questions required and working with our partners at TYLin and Introba to provide the practical answers the industry needs around cost, feasibility, time and carbon impact. We all know that transformation is required. We can provide the certainty the industry needs to make the leap towards a sustainable future. We believe it is possible for data centers to continue to grow and decarbonize, but the industry needs to act decisively to make that a reality.