More than zero carbon, sustainable development of data centers is on the way

Source: China IDC Circle

As an indispensable infrastructure for the digital economy, data centers have entered a stage of rapid development in recent years. The "Report" released by Kezhi Consulting shows that in 2020, China's domestic IDC market share, including cloud computing infrastructure, will reach 223.87 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 43.3%.

The booming market has in turn promoted the construction and investment of data centers in the industry. New data center projects have sprung up in various places, and there is a trend of increasing investment and scale. At the same time, many problems hindering long-term development, such as increasing energy consumption, resource misallocation, excessive investment, blind construction, and regional imbalance, have gradually emerged in front of the industry and society.

How can the data center industry achieve sustainable development while advancing at a high speed? On December 21, a wonderful and unique roundtable discussion was held at the 16th China IDC Industry Annual Ceremony (IDCC2021). The organizers invited leaders from local governments, experts from research institutions, and executives from leading companies to discuss the topic of "the sustainable development path of data centers" from the perspectives of politics, research and production.

The roundtable was chaired by Mr. He Baohong, an Internet research expert and director of the Institute of Cloud Computing and Big Data, China Academy of Information and Communications Technology. The speakers were Jin Heping, chief information officer of China Three Gorges Corporation, chairman of the Data Center Committee of China Communications Industry Association, and Long Xian, deputy secretary-general of Shaoguan Municipal People's Government. Shun, Zhang Yong, Deputy Mayor of Zixing Municipal People's Government, Xu Suhai, General Manager of Data Center Division of Sinochem Jinmao Smart Energy Company, and Chen Jiangping, Senior Vice President of GDS.

Resources and policies are combined to create a sustainable industrial environment

While the data center industry continues to expand its scale and computing power, it also consumes huge amounts of energy like an energy-eating monster. Statistics show that in the past ten years, the electricity consumption of data centers in my country has increased by more than 10% every year, and its electricity consumption will exceed 200 billion kWh in 2020, accounting for about 2.71% of the electricity consumption of the whole society. It is predicted that by 2025, the power consumption of data centers will account for 4.05% of the total power consumption of society.

Such a rise in energy consumption is obviously contrary to the main tone of the current "two-carbon" strategy of green development, and is also the biggest obstacle to the sustainable development of data centers. When local governments make industrial planning for the data center industry, they often take PUE and other energy consumption and energy efficiency indicators as the starting point to effectively achieve the purpose of industrial regulation.

Regarding how to achieve green development of the local data center industry, leaders from local governments are more inclined to promote the healthy implementation of the industry through the deployment of green resources and policy services.

Zhang Yong said that Zixing is rich in water resources and wind, light and green power resources, and the green power utilization rate of the data center will reach more than 80% in the next two years. At the same time, the cost of electricity has great advantages. At the same time, Zixing City vigorously promotes sustainable development measures such as network construction and source network load storage projects.

In 2017, Zixing City planned the Hunan Big Data Industrial Park, the only approved digital industrial park in Hunan Province, with a planned area of ​​4,500 mu, a capacity of 200,000 racks, and a design PUE of less than 1.2. The park is about 5-10 kilometers downstream of the Dongjianghu Hydropower Dam. The natural ecological cold water entering the park has a constant temperature of 8-13 degrees in four seasons, which can meet the all-weather cooling needs of the park.

Long Xianshun introduced that Shaoguan has advantages in location and climate. The annual average temperature is only 20 degrees, which is the region with the lowest annual average temperature in Guangdong Province. Shaoguan has sufficient power resources, and the power surplus in 2020 will reach 15.2 billion kWh. Shaoguan is rich in hydropower and vigorously develops solar energy. It is estimated that during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, the city can increase the installed photovoltaic capacity by 1200MW.

The first direction of industrial development in Shaoguan's "14th Five-Year Plan" period is to extend industries related to hub nodes. The second is to develop the electronic information industry and the big data industry. Including semiconductor integrated circuits, electronic materials and electronic components, including data mining, software outsourcing, etc. The third is to realize the digitization of the real economy and play its due role in improving the quality and efficiency of agriculture, rural areas, industry and service industries.

Technology + Market to Create a Zero-Carbon Future of Data Centers

In July this year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology officially released the "Three-Year Action Plan for the Development of New Data Centers (2021-2023)", focusing on guiding new data centers to take a green and low-carbon development path that is efficient, clean, intensive and circular. First, accelerate the application of advanced green technology products. The second is to continuously improve the level of efficient and clean energy utilization. The third is to optimize green management capabilities.

For enterprises, on the premise of conforming to the overall situation and policies of the country, technological innovation and market means have always been the best tools to solve problems encountered in development. Under the background of the "double carbon" strategy, the data center industry has worked hard in the development of green energy-saving technologies.

China Three Gorges Corporation is both an energy company and a data center service provider. Jin Heping said that the CTG data center uses clean energy and has achieved zero-carbon operation. As a state-owned enterprise, China Three Gorges Corporation is the largest clean energy supplier in China and even in the world. It can combine with local governments to combine the development of green resources in various places with the construction of IDCs to achieve a win-win situation for enterprises and localities.

Xu Suhai said in his speech that the concept of green and sustainable development is the first step in building planning, and it is necessary to jump out of the industry and consider the rationality of planning from the overall perspective of government and urban needs. The data center is the foundation of the future development of the digital economy, and its energy consumption must be considered from a global perspective. Integrating into the urban energy system and eliminating backward production capacity is the only way for the sustainable development of data centers in the future.

Chen Jiangping said that GDS is a national enterprise and has a very deep understanding of the differences in conditions and resource endowments in different regions. According to GDS, carbon neutrality in data centers is a systematic project. For individual data centers, GDS uses technologies such as green energy saving, clean energy, and photovoltaic energy storage to reduce carbon emissions. On the whole, the ultimate carbon neutrality goal is achieved through various energy investments and a combination of green certificate transactions and green power transactions.

Optimize the industrial environment and improve the efficiency of resource use

Misallocation of resources and blind development are frequently encountered problems in the period of rapid industrial development. Optimizing the industrial environment, reducing duplication of construction, and reducing waste of resources requires the joint efforts of the government and the industry to improve the rules of industrial development through policies, investment, markets, and other means, so as to remove the rubbish and save the quintessence, and realize the sustainable development of the industry.

Zixing City's attitude towards digital investment is to "build a highland of resources and a depression of policy", which Zhang Yong described as "building a nest to attract phoenixes and make friends." The local government has provided a number of preferential policies for attracting data center enterprises to settle in, including land, taxation, etc., and is committed to solving network and talent problems for digital enterprises. At the same time, extensive contact with industry experts to further understand the industry and interpret the market.

Long Xianshun summed up Shaoguan's digital industry policy into five measures: attracting sources, retaining roots, cultivating soil, raising seedlings and making a name for themselves. The so-called attracting resources means attracting investment; retaining roots means formulating a talent policy for the big data industry; cultivating soil means building a state of a core multi-industrial park with the South China Valley as the core; cultivating seedlings, through the entrepreneurial nursery + incubator + accelerator innovation incubation system, plus Big support for the data industry; fame is to carry out a series of data industry forums to promote Shaoguan to the whole country and the world.

Jin Heping proposed two continuations: sustainable market demand and sustainable IDC infrastructure supply. He believes that energy and digital are twins, and sustainable low-cost green and clean energy is the basic guarantee for the sustainable development of data centers. In the future, we need to think about how to match the supply of sustainable low-cost clean energy with the consumption demand of IDC energy. stand up.

Chen Jiangping said that the sustainable development of the data center industry requires multi-point layout and continuous policy support. He believes that the multi-point layout can not only effectively absorb clean energy in different regions, but also contribute to the stability and security of the industry. And call on local governments to consider the characteristics of the long life cycle of the data center industry and formulate policies suitable for long-term development.

Xu Suhai proposed that in the process of attracting investment in the data center industry, it is necessary to identify real investment and industrial construction, rather than "occupying the pit". In the process of practice, it is common for resources to be ineffectively occupied, resulting in the failure of the project to be implemented, which will adversely affect the development of the local digital industry and the business environment.

He Baohong continued to make incisive summaries while guiding the guests to speak. He said that promoting the sustainable development of data centers requires high-quality energy supply, the sustainable development of customers, and the development of new data centers with high technology, high energy efficiency, high reliability and high security, and the joint promotion of the industry and the government. .

| Article source: China IDC circle