Data centres. They’re not glamorous and they’re certainly not eco friendly, gobbling up electricity like Robbie Coltrane tucking in to finger food at a free buffet. But that’s all about to change. A Finnish IT firm is to open the most eco-friendly data centre on earth – situated in a bedrock cave underneath a 19th century Eastern Orthodox Cathedral in Helsinki. Not your average file vault. Read on for all the info.
Academica will harvest the heat generated from its data centre, comprised of hundreds of servers below the Uspenski Cathedral, which in turn will be channeled into the water heated pipes that make up Helsinki’s heating network. The amount of energy generated will be the equivalent to the power of one large wind turbine and will be enough to heat 500 homes.
The project begins in January and, as well as pleasing Mother Nature, will also save the Finnish company an estimated £335,000 a year. Everyone’s a winner baby.
It’s estimated that data centres all over the world account for up to a third of a business’s energy bill, with much of the cost focused on cooling the servers that make up the centres. Google has some of the world’s largest data centres, so imagine how much heat Google could harvest!
We salute Academica and its original approach to dealing with the problems of an ever expanding technological world. Now, if you’ll excuse us, we’re off to send a few more emails to help keep the house warm.
Out January 2010 | Academica (via smartplanet)
