Energy & Water Use Impacts of Building System Design for Data Centers

Abstract

Data centers energy and water use are an important issues for the Pacific Northwest. Implementing data center energy efficiency and peak power reductions would provide some of the most significant energy savings available to the region.

Some highlights of the study:

• PNW is a likely location for data centers—the region meets all the criteria.
  • The electricity use could range from 3,000 to 8,000 average megawatts by 2029; equivalent to the energy used by three to eight cities the size of Seattle.
• There is a big difference between the ASHRAE national standard for data center and the best practice technologies for building cooling systems.
  • The potential savings are equivalent to 2 million to 4 million megawatt hours.
  • These savings are only from building system improvements without any reduction in data center quantity.
• The study identified a potential for 1,000 megawatt reduction in peak energy savings from best-practices cooling systems:
  • Evaporative cooling systems are 28% more efficient than current standards.
  • Best-practices air-cooled savings are 4% more efficient.
  • Air-cooled compressors have large peak loads, especially during summer afternoons and evenings.
  • Peak loads are expensive to serve, stress the electricity system, and hurt migrating salmon.
• The study also looked at the water use of data centers.
  • The total projected use of evaporative cooling is a small percentage of water use.
  • The local effects on salmon and steelhead need to be addressed.

If you have questions please contact Chris Golightly at CRITFC.