Unpicking the datacentre industry's complicated relationship with climate change

By Nicholas Fearn

Datacentres are without doubt the beating heart of our increasingly digital economy. For proof of that, one only has to look at the havoc and disruption caused when an outage results in a datacentre falling offline – even if it is only for a relatively short amount of time.

Such outages can be caused by operator error, power supply problems and defective hardware, but natural disasters and extreme weather events can also play a part.

And for this reason, there are concerns that datacentre operators and owners are not doing enough to prepare themselves for the havoc climate change may cause to their facilities.

[...]

[Andy] Lawrence [executive director of Uptime Institute] believes the effects of climate change on datacentres are “significant”, but too few operators are taking protective steps to mitigate them, which could have dire consequences for them in the long run.

[...]

Global warming is one of the most serious challenges to humanity today, and it is no secret that it’s impacting a range of industries. The datacentre space is no different.

As extreme weather events continue to occur, there will be increased pressure on organisations to invest in more eco alternatives to not only protect themselves against these threats, but contribute towards creating a greener world.