Faced with rising energy prices, manufacturers are looking for countermeasures to reduce the bill. This is particularly true for data centers, which use energy to operate but also to cool facilities. The number of data centers continues to increase around the world, aided by cryptocurrency mining, so much so that they are responsible, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), for around 1% of global energy demand.
So to cool down at a lower cost, a Japanese company had the idea of taking advantage of its natural environment: snow. The White Data Center (WDC) thus uses the snow to lower the temperature of the servers. In Bibai, in northern Japan, the facility benefits from the harsh winters on the island of Hokkaido.
55% cost reduction
The idea is actually to cool the circuits that contain the antifreeze, says CNN, indicating that the center has reduced cooling costs for its facilities by 55%. A good argument that the company hopes to use to attract customers to the far north.
Especially since the cool summers in the region allow the snow to be kept under wood chips and earth and thus avoid its waste. And the WDC goes further by exploiting the heated and melted snow to raise eels, sea urchins and mushrooms.
Large server operators are beginning to move away from temperate regions to establish data centers in colder climates, such as northern Europe. Facebook has installed servers in Denmark, while Google has a center in Finland, this time using seawater.
Source: BFM TV
