The decarbonization of data centers is a topic we have been working on for many years. Just a quick search found several articles I wrote about data center decarbonization efforts back in 2011, over a decade ago. However, the discussion on this topic is usually quite simple, focusing on how much a company or data center gets its electricity from renewable energy sources. I recently sat down with a few data center decarbonization experts from Hitachi’s Environmental Business Division to find out more, and it turns out they made the topic a lot more fun and interesting than I ever expected!
Let’s start with some background before we dive into decarbonizing the data center.
I had this conversation with Jody Heyroth, Senior Director of Operations at Hitachi Environmental Business Division, and Justin Bean, who works on Solution Innovation and Strategy, Sustainability and ESG at Hitachi Environmental Business Division. Jody noted that Hitachi, despite being in business for approximately 112 years, is constantly focused on the future and innovation. “We are a business driven by innovation,” he emphasized. “We have a mission to contribute to society through the development of superior, original technology and products.” Hitachi manufactures a wide range of products: automotive equipment, high-speed train technology, computer storage equipment, health technology, power grid technology and more. He is also deeply involved in the software side of these industries.
Data center decarbonization challenges and general solutions
The focus on innovation and continuous improvement is emphasized in how Jody and Justin talk about decarbonizing the data center. To start, here’s a good overview of the key challenges and general solutions from Jody’s point of view:
“The challenge that data center operators have today is to figure out how to balance this sustainable growth. How do you get more out of that existing facility, right—the footprint of that facility, the energy supply for that facility? But then also making sure that as they go out and build new data centers, that they’re built with this whole sustainability mindset. So you know, can data centers be more sustainable? Yes, absolutely.
“They can get power from renewable energy sources — like wind, solar and geothermal.” They can use efficient solutions to move electricity from the grid to the equipment. They may also have more efficient server and network and storage equipment. And when we talk about the type of efficiency, we mean the physical footprint (how much space that equipment takes up), what is its energy consumption, as well as what is the heat generated? Because as most people know, the challenge with data centers is all this IT equipment inside — it creates a massive the amount of heat and how to control and manage it to protect the equipment, but do it in an efficient way.
“But we also can’t forget about applications — you know, they’re the real consumers of the data center. We can be more efficient in design and the flexibility of our applications so that they can use right resources on right time in right locations to really reduce their impact on the environment.”
Getting into the details of decarbonizing data centers
Jody and Justin then get more detailed. We touch on monitoring IT equipment, analyzing the carbon impact of specific servers, determining how to reallocate resources to minimize operational carbon impact, and more. We’re talking about building or acquiring renewable energy directly versus buying emissions offsets or renewable energy credits. We talk about the internal and different kinds of external pressures that are being put on corporations to become more sustainable—on a real, deep level. After talking a bit about the detailed scale at the equipment level, more and more customers are looking to save energy and decarbonize, Jody also emphasized the growing role of performance monitoring.
“There is this element of accountability and responsibility. You have to be able to measure and you realize, ‘Okay, great, I did that project, I upgraded that equipment — did it move the needle like I expected?’ and really be able to understand the impact. And that’s actually something that we’re really starting to see even more, because as organizations go about achieving these sustainability goals and initiatives, it’s going to take investment, but is it the right investment for the right long-term benefit? For that investment, that now means data center managers and sustainability managers need to be able to bring those stories back to the C-suite so they can explain and defend the case for that investment and the case for continued investment in being able to get them there.”
I asked about the challenge of deciding when to just keep working with existing equipment and simply try to optimize it with one tweak after another versus when to buy new, more efficient equipment and write off the old equipment. Justin replied thoughtfully and with some good details:
“Yeah, yeah, there’s some tension, isn’t there? So they might want to move to a more efficient infrastructure, but that’s going to hold a lot of embodied carbon, right? And it takes a lot to build, assemble and transport all that equipment, so they don’t want to just tear it down and replace it completely, they’ll want to understand when it’s optimal to replace it – because I’m going to replace this hardware after all – but with the right tools and analytics and information, they can understand when it makes sense to replace that infrastructure, when it’s starting to shrink from an operational standpoint, but also when it’s starting to use more electricity and have more emissions associated with that, the point where you’re going to want to replace it with something more efficient.
“And so having those tools is really helpful for them to know when it’s the right time to replace it and understand what that embodied carbon is and what e-waste would be for them — because that’s a lot of e-waste in the world.” is huge, and data centers contribute to that.”
It’s a journey, a multifaceted approach
As a sort of final summary of the problem, Jody states, “When we think about sustainability and improving the performance of the data center, you know, it’s really multiple access. I think you have to think about it in terms of your power supply – so where do you get your primary power for your data center, what is it that your local utility company provides; what might be available based on where your facility is located? […] You also have to think about it in relation to the backup power supply. You have to think about it in terms of power equipment, right? So looking at that transformer equipment, looking and understanding how you get power from the meter to your IT racks that are in your data center. It is also about construction infrastructure. So, think about it in terms of your HVAC systems providing overall cooling and temperature management for the facility. That’s IT infrastructure, right — server and network and storage equipment. These are applications. These are people in the process.
“That seems like a lot, doesn’t it? (haha) But that’s pretty much all the aspects you’d look at in terms of the kind of data center — kind of an overall health or sustainability standpoint. But, you know, do you have to tackle everything at once? no. This is a road trip or maybe it’s a marathon, or maybe it’s more like an urban adventure race if that’s a better analogy. (haha)”
It’s fun! It’s like going to Disney World
Justin also highlighted the fun of the process: “There are also new innovations that appear quite quickly. Just like the rest of the technology sector, there is a tons innovation, there’s a ton of new opportunities that are emerging in the industry — things like immersion cooling, which is actually immersing your infrastructure in a coolant, in a liquid coolant. [There are] all those different ways of approaching a problem that could be a really interesting path. There are many new AI models for controlling HVAC systems and applications and all that. There are also different ways to do it. Would you like to switch your calculation to another one? geography at a certain time of day? Is there a strategy you can take in that kind of data management and storage operations? Do you need something at this point and at other points — it’s starting to look a bit like power management, where you want to use battery power when electricity is expensive, and you want to use grid power when it’s cheap. […]
“It’s really about understanding how much you’re spending on electricity, where there might be savings opportunities. Maybe there is something really simple. We recently talked to a data center that had just put some plastic curtains around certain areas of the data center to change the heat flow, and it gave them a huge reduction in energy consumption – on the order of hundreds of thousands of dollars. So there’s a lot of interesting things you can do that can save you millions of dollars, maybe tens of thousands, or just make your life easier because it’s a lot easier to send a report to the sustainability manager of what your emissions are and then what your plan to reduce them.”
I jokingly (but I really love this metaphor) compared it to going to Disney World. “I think we can say that it is quite right like going to Disney World — that’s basically what you’re saying here. Before you is a great course, a great adventure; you have different technological innovations, it’s exciting; sometimes you have headaches, get exhausted; you have to plan your projects — ‘we’ll tackle this right now, we’ll tackle that later’; you can explore different worlds. I was going to make a joke earlier and then you kept adding this. I said, ‘This is a perfect metaphor.’ The only thing you don’t have are kids screaming behind you, but if you work from home, maybe you do—you’re a techie, right?”
There’s much, much more to the podcast. Listen to the full discussion for more insight into decarbonizing data centers thoroughly, efficiently and thoughtfully.
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