1. |
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY |
1.1. |
What is a data center? |
1.2. |
Leading global data center hyperscalers |
1.3. |
Data center sustainability metrics |
1.4. |
Scope of IDTechEx's data center decarbonization report |
1.5. |
Introduction to Basic Definitions |
1.6. |
Motivations behind data center sustainability and carbon reductions |
1.7. |
Current picture: Data Center CO2 emissions |
1.8. |
Power demand from data centers will increase significantly over the coming decade |
1.9. |
Data centers get power from the grid |
1.10. |
Which sustainable technologies can have the biggest impact (1/2)? |
1.11. |
Which sustainable technologies can have the biggest impact (2/2)? |
1.12. |
Renewable energy portfolios of data center hyperscalers |
1.13. |
Methods of accounting for scope 2 (power-based) emissions are coming under scrutiny |
1.14. |
Comparison of different power sources for data centers |
1.15. |
Cost comparison of different energy sources |
1.16. |
Wind and solar power dominate the renewable energy portfolios of data centers |
1.17. |
Outlook for solar energy for data centers (1/2) |
1.18. |
Outlook for solar energy for data centers (2/2) |
1.19. |
Outlook for wind energy for data centers |
1.20. |
Outlook: Small modular reactors aim to make nuclear power economically viable |
1.21. |
Fuel cells for data centers |
1.22. |
Outlook: batteries and energy storage for data centers |
1.23. |
Savings from carbon free energy forecast: 2025-2035 |
1.24. |
Policies for data center decarbonization |
1.25. |
Regional Actions on Reducing GHG Emission |
1.26. |
Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) |
1.27. |
Cooling - an important consideration for overall energy efficiency, IT equipment performance, and GHG emission |
1.28. |
Key Actions of Enabling Sustainable Data Centers Through Enhanced Energy Efficiency - Summary |
1.29. |
Cooling Technology Comparison |
1.30. |
Quantifying Carbon Reduction - Air and Direct-to-Chip Cooling |
1.31. |
Electrical and IT Efficiency |
1.32. |
Scope 2: Global Data Center Lifecycle CO2e (Market-Based Method) Forecast: 2021-2035 |
1.33. |
CO2 emissions of data centers - Scope 3 |
1.34. |
Scope 2 and Scope 3 CO2e forecast (market-based): 2021-2035 |
1.35. |
IT makes the largest contribution to embodied carbon |
1.36. |
Manufacturing/Embodied GHG Emission - IT Componentry Level Split |
1.37. |
Construction of data centers increases scope 3 emissions |
1.38. |
Book and claim system for low-carbon construction |
1.39. |
Data center hyperscalers purchase carbon removal credits for emissions that cannot be otherwise reduced |
2. |
INTRODUCTION |
2.1. |
Overview |
2.1.1. |
What is a data center? |
2.1.2. |
Data center sustainability metrics |
2.1.3. |
Scope of IDTechEx's data center decarbonization report |
2.1.4. |
Data Center CO2 emissions |
2.1.5. |
Motivations behind data center sustainability and carbon reductions |
2.1.6. |
Leading global data center hyperscalers |
2.1.7. |
Introduction to Basic Definitions |
2.1.8. |
CO2 emissions of data center hyperscalers - scope 2: market-based vs location-based |
2.1.9. |
CO2 emissions of data center hyperscalers |
2.1.10. |
CO2 emissions of data center hyperscalers - scope 3 |
2.1.11. |
GHG Emission Targets From Hyperscalers and Colocators |
2.1.12. |
Policies for data center decarbonization |
2.1.13. |
Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) |
2.1.14. |
Carbon Usage Effectiveness (CUE) |
2.1.15. |
Regional Actions on Reducing GHG Emission |
2.1.16. |
Hyperscale data centers are the most efficient |
2.1.17. |
Data Center Equipment - Top Level Overview |
2.1.18. |
Operating Emission Factors for Cloud Computing CPUs |
2.1.19. |
Operating Emission Factors for Cloud Computing CPUs - Trend Analysis |
2.1.20. |
Total Carbon Emission: Manufacturing + Operating + EoL + Transportation |
2.2. |
Actions of leading data center owners for sourcing clean energy and related technologies |
2.2.1. |
A Summary of Recent Announcements of Leading Data Center Owners Sourcing Clean Energy and Related Technologies - Carbon Credits |
2.2.2. |
A Summary of Recent Announcements of Leading Data Center Owners Sourcing Clean Energy and Related Technologies - Nuclear |
2.2.3. |
A Summary of Recent Announcements of Leading Data Center Owners Sourcing Clean Energy and Related Technologies - Other Renewables |
3. |
DECARBONIZED POWER GENERATION FOR DATA CENTERS |
3.1. |
Introduction |
3.1.1. |
Data centers consume large amounts of power globally |
3.1.2. |
Data centers get power from the grid |
3.1.3. |
Carbon intensity of power production varies geographically |
3.1.4. |
Ways for data centers to decarbonize power and lower scope 2 emissions |
3.1.5. |
Purchase low-carbon power: Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) |
3.1.6. |
Purchase low-carbon power: Power purchasing agreements (PPAs) |
3.1.7. |
Clean Transition Tariffs |
3.1.8. |
Renewable energy portfolios of data center hyperscalers |
3.1.9. |
Should the location of renewable power generation matter? |
3.1.10. |
Benchmarking electricity sources |
3.1.11. |
Comparison of different power sources for data centers |
3.1.12. |
Cost comparison of different renewable energy sources |
3.1.13. |
Wind and solar power dominate the renewable energy portfolios of data centers |
3.1.14. |
Microgrids for data centers |
3.1.15. |
Low-carbon microgrids for data centers: case studies (1/2) |
3.1.16. |
Low-carbon microgrids for data centers: case studies (2/2) |
3.1.17. |
Energy storage: the importance of batteries and hydrogen |
3.1.18. |
Low-carbon energy technologies for data center power generation within the scope of this report |
3.2. |
Solar |
3.2.1. |
Solar Installation Capacity Summary |
3.2.2. |
Solar energy - challenges of intermittency and energy storage solutions |
3.2.3. |
Other challenges of solar in data centers - Intermittency and Footprint |
3.2.4. |
Outlook for solar energy in data centers (1/2) |
3.2.5. |
Outlook for solar energy in data centers (2/2) |
3.3. |
Wind |
3.3.1. |
Wind power introduction |
3.3.2. |
Power Efficiency and Wind Turbine Model (1/2) |
3.3.3. |
Power Efficiency and Wind Turbine Model (2/2) |
3.3.4. |
Approaches of getting wind energy powered data centers (1/2) |
3.3.5. |
Approaches of getting wind energy powered data centers (2/2) |
3.3.6. |
Wind and solar combined solution - actions from leading tech companies |
3.3.7. |
Solutions to stabilize the wind power supply |
3.4. |
Geothermal |
3.4.1. |
Introduction to geothermal power |
3.4.2. |
Regions with high geothermal potential |
3.4.3. |
Introduction to enhanced geothermal systems |
3.4.4. |
Economics of enhanced geothermal systems |
3.4.5. |
Geothermal power for data centers |
3.4.6. |
Enhanced geothermal systems for data centers: Sage Geosystems and Fervo Energy |
3.4.7. |
Outlook: Geothermal energy for data centers |
3.5. |
Nuclear Power - Large-Scale, Small Modular Reactors (SMRs), and Nuclear Fusion |
3.5.1. |
With the aim of decarbonization, nuclear energy poses potential compared with other renewables |
3.5.2. |
Large-scale nuclear reactors |
3.5.3. |
Small modular reactors (SMRs): what and why? |
3.5.4. |
Small modular reactors |
3.5.5. |
SMRs could work alongside renewable energy systems towards decarbonization |
3.5.6. |
Where are the SMR projects? |
3.5.7. |
SMR technology in development |
3.5.8. |
A Summary of Recent Announcements of Leading Data Center Owners Sourcing Clean Energy and Related Technologies - Nuclear |
3.5.9. |
Which SMR reactor design will be favoured by data center players? |
3.5.10. |
What is holding back SMRs? |
3.5.11. |
Are SMRs safer than large nuclear power plants? |
3.5.12. |
Conclusions: SMRs aim to make nuclear power economically viable |
3.5.13. |
Potentials on nuclear fusion |
3.6. |
Fuel cells and hydrogen |
3.6.1. |
Fuel cells for data centers |
3.6.2. |
The importance of back-up power: significant consequences for data center downtime (1/2) |
3.6.3. |
The importance of back-up power: significant consequences for data center downtime (2/2) |
3.6.4. |
Advantages of hydrogen |
3.6.5. |
What are fuel cells? |
3.6.6. |
Proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) technology overview |
3.6.7. |
Solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) technology overview |
3.6.8. |
Data centers: PEMFCs and SOFCs |
3.6.9. |
Data centres and telecom application technology considerations |
3.6.10. |
Technology benchmarking for data centres and telecommunications applications |
3.6.11. |
The hydrogen economy and its impact on the fuel cell market |
3.6.12. |
Status of hydrogen |
3.6.13. |
Barriers remain for low-carbon hydrogen |
3.6.14. |
Key players for PEMFC and SOFC stationary fuel cells |
3.6.15. |
PEMFC data center case studies: projects use hydrogen |
3.6.16. |
SOFC data center case studies: projects use natural gas instead of hydrogen |
3.6.17. |
Outlook: Hydrogen fuel cells in data centers |
3.7. |
Batteries and energy storage |
3.7.1. |
Batteries for data center energy storage |
3.7.2. |
UPS battery technologies |
3.7.3. |
Grid-interactive UPS technologies |
3.7.4. |
Batteries for back-up power generation in data centers - case studies |
3.7.5. |
BESS (Battery Energy Storage Systems) for data centers - renewable energy storage |
3.7.6. |
BESS for data centers - other behind-the-meter deployment |
3.7.7. |
Front-of-meter BESS for data centers |
3.7.8. |
Grid-scale energy storage: the rise of Li-ion |
3.7.9. |
Key players in grid-scale Li-ion BESS |
3.7.10. |
Outlook: batteries and energy storage for data centers |
4. |
ENERGY EFFICIENCY FOR DATA CENTERS |
4.1. |
Introduction |
4.1.1. |
Key Actions of Enabling Sustainable Data Centers Through Enhanced Energy Efficiency - Summary |
4.1.2. |
Avenues to improve efficiencies |
4.1.3. |
Data center's system power consumption by component and efficiency metrics |
4.2. |
Thermal efficiency |
4.2.1. |
Increasing TDP Drives More Efficient Thermal Management |
4.2.2. |
Thermal Level - Data Center Cooling Supply Chain |
4.2.3. |
Historic Data of TDP - GPU |
4.2.4. |
TDP Trend: Historic Data and Forecast Data - CPU |
4.2.5. |
Cooling Methods Overview |
4.2.6. |
Cooling Technology Comparison |
4.2.7. |
Cooling Technology Comparison (2) |
4.2.8. |
Liquid Cooling - Power Limitation of Different Cooling on Rack Level |
4.2.9. |
Different Cooling on Chip Level |
4.2.10. |
Air Cooling Configuration in Data Centers |
4.2.11. |
Hybrid Liquid-to-Air Cooling Configuration in Data Centers |
4.2.12. |
Hybrid Liquid-to-Liquid Cooling Configuration in Data Centers |
4.2.13. |
Hybrid Liquid-to-Refrigerant Cooling Configuration in Data Centers |
4.2.14. |
Hybrid Refrigerant-to-Refrigerant Cooling Configuration in Data Centers |
4.2.15. |
Quantifying Carbon Reduction - Air and Direct-to-Chip Cooling |
4.2.16. |
GHG emission by cooling method |
4.2.17. |
Water consumption by cooling method |
4.2.18. |
Actions of Amazon AWS in Enhancing Thermal Efficiency |
4.2.19. |
Actions of Microsoft in Enhancing Thermal Efficiency |
4.2.20. |
Actions of Google in Enhancing Thermal Efficiency |
4.2.21. |
Actions of Meta in Enhancing Thermal Efficiency |
4.2.22. |
Cooling Tower - Adiabatic Cooling |
4.2.23. |
Balance Between Water Use and Power Use - Case by Case in Practice |
4.2.24. |
Use Case: Jaeggi - Adiabatic and Hybrid Dry Coolers |
4.3. |
IT efficiency |
4.3.1. |
Power demand from data centers will increase significantly over the coming decade |
4.3.2. |
Key assumptions Driving Data Center Power Demand - ROI Has Significant Impacts on the Power Demand Projection |
4.3.3. |
Key assumptions Driving Data Center Power Demand - Power Efficiency Gains |
4.3.4. |
Data Center Power Forecast By Hyperscalers, Colocators, and Enterprise Users: 2013-2035 |
4.3.5. |
Data Center Carbon Emission by Data Center Type |
4.3.6. |
Energy Efficiency Increase on Componentry Level Covered in This Report |
4.3.7. |
Critical IT components for data centers |
4.3.8. |
Server level: CO2e and water consumption with and without renewable energy |
4.3.9. |
Enhanced Efficiency of Data Center Component - Purpose-Built Chips |
4.3.10. |
Trend Towards a Higher Power Efficiency - Enhanced Efficiency of CPU |
4.3.11. |
Trend Towards a Lower Power per Unit of Compute Speed - Enhanced Efficiency of GPUs |
4.3.12. |
GHG Emission of Hard Disks - HDDs and SSDs |
4.3.13. |
Manufacturing GHG Emission Per GB of Storage - HDDs Offer Reduced CO2e |
4.3.14. |
Capacity/Power (GB/W) - Enhanced Memory Module Efficiency |
4.4. |
Electrical efficiency |
4.4.1. |
Electrical Level - Data Center Power Components Supply Chain |
4.4.2. |
Efficient UPS Systems |
4.4.3. |
Efficient Power Conversion - Power Electronics in Data Centers |
4.4.4. |
Efficient Power Conversion - Si IGBT to SiC MOSFETs |
4.4.5. |
Potential for GaN - Combination of SiC and GaN might be the solution |
4.4.6. |
Reduced climate impact for GaN |
4.4.7. |
Ongoing Transition from 12V to 48V Power Supply |
4.4.8. |
Intelligent Monitoring Tools and Data Center Infrastructure Management (DCIM) Software to Track Energy Usage in Real-Time |
5. |
ADDITIONAL SCOPE 3 DECARBONIZATION FOR DATA CENTERS |
5.1. |
Introduction |
5.1.1. |
CO2 emissions of data centers - scope 3 |
5.2. |
Carbon credits/CO2 offsetting |
5.2.1. |
What is a carbon credit and carbon offsetting? |
5.2.2. |
Carbon removal vs carbon avoidance offsetting |
5.2.3. |
The approach of data center hyperscalers towards CO2 offsetting |
5.2.4. |
Overall Voluntary Carbon Markets |
5.2.5. |
High-quality carbon removals: durability, permanence, additionality |
5.2.6. |
Technology Readiness Level (TRL): Carbon dioxide removal methods that can generate carbon credits |
5.2.7. |
Carbon dioxide removal technology benchmarking |
5.2.8. |
Status and potential of CDR technologies |
5.2.9. |
How are carbon credits certified? |
5.2.10. |
Carbon crediting programs |
5.2.11. |
The role of carbon registries in the credit market |
5.2.12. |
How are voluntary carbon credits purchased? |
5.2.13. |
The carbon removal market players |
5.2.14. |
Data center hyperscalers are the biggest durable carbon removal buyers |
5.2.15. |
Advanced market commitment in CDR |
5.2.16. |
Ensuring high quality credits |
5.2.17. |
Shifting buyer preferences for durable CDR in carbon credit markets |
5.2.18. |
Pre-purchases still dominate the durable CDR space |
5.2.19. |
Prices of CDR credits |
5.2.20. |
How expensive are durable carbon removals credits? |
5.2.21. |
Current CDR carbon credit prices by company and technology |
5.2.22. |
Biochar: Key takeaways |
5.2.23. |
Introduction to BECCS |
5.2.24. |
Significant growth possible for BECCS over the next decade |
5.2.25. |
Biomass burial for CO2 removal |
5.2.26. |
Bio-oil geological storage for CDR |
5.2.27. |
What is direct air capture (DAC)? |
5.2.28. |
Challenges associated with DAC technology |
5.2.29. |
Players targeting 70 Mtpa of DACCS capacity in 2030 |
5.2.30. |
Direct Air Capture Technology Landscape |
5.2.31. |
Solid sorbents are the leading DACCS technology |
5.2.32. |
On-site direct air capture for data centers |
5.2.33. |
Afforestation and reforestation: key takeaways |
5.2.34. |
"Just plant more trees!" - sustainability and greenwashing considerations |
5.2.35. |
Mineralization: key takeaways |
5.2.36. |
Ocean-based NETs |
5.2.37. |
Ocean-based CDR: key takeaways |
5.2.38. |
Carbon dioxide removal capacity forecast by technology (million metric tons of CO2 per year), 2024-2044 |
5.2.39. |
Carbon credits and Article 6.4 of the Paris Agreement |
5.3. |
Green concrete and green steel: low-carbon construction |
5.3.1. |
Construction of data centers is increasing |
5.3.2. |
Book and claim system for low-carbon construction |
5.3.3. |
Contribution of concrete to data center CO2 footprint |
5.3.4. |
How much concrete and steel is needed to build a data center? |
5.3.5. |
How much does data center construction cost? |
5.3.6. |
Precast concrete in data center construction |
5.3.7. |
Low-carbon concrete requires cement decarbonization technologies |
5.3.8. |
Benchmarking cement decarbonization technologies |
5.3.9. |
Why is cement production hard to decarbonize? |
5.3.10. |
How much will the green premium be for decarbonized cement? |
5.3.11. |
Cement decarbonization - Analyst viewpoint: Benchmarking of cement decarbonization technologies |
5.3.12. |
Technologies for cement decarbonization - megatonnes per annum of CO2 avoided (2025-2035) |
5.3.13. |
Introduction to supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) |
5.3.14. |
What are the leading supplementary cementitious materials? |
5.3.15. |
Data center hyperscalers have formed partnerships with low-carbon concrete start-ups |
5.3.16. |
CO2 as a performance enhancing additive |
5.3.17. |
Microbial biocement (calcium carbonate cement) |
5.3.18. |
New calcium silicate cements start-ups |
5.3.19. |
Electrochemical cement processing |
5.3.20. |
CO2 utilization enables alternative cementitious materials through mineralization |
5.3.21. |
Role of steel in data centers |
5.3.22. |
Overview of decarbonization technologies for the steel sector |
5.3.23. |
Tech companies' interest in green steel |
5.3.24. |
Data center hyperscalers have formed partnerships with low-carbon steel players |
5.3.25. |
Cross-laminated timber as a low-carbon construction material |
5.4. |
Manufacturing/embodied carbon |
5.4.1. |
Scope 3 data center emissions - the importance of embodied carbon |
5.4.2. |
IT makes the largest contribution to embodied carbon |
5.4.3. |
Manufacturing/Embodied Carbon Emission: Motherboard + Hard Disks |
5.4.4. |
GHG Emission of Hard Disks - HDDs and SSDs |
5.4.5. |
Manufacturing/Embodied GHG Emission Per GB of Storage - SSDs and HDDs for Data Center/HPC Servers |
5.4.6. |
Manufacturing/Embodied GHG Emission - Componentry Level Split |
5.4.7. |
Memory Storage Drive Reuse - Critical Way to Reduce GHG Emission as Storage Drives have Significant GHG Emission from Manufacturing |
6. |
FORECASTS |
6.1. |
CO2e/kWh versus carbon-free energy adoption rate |
6.2. |
Trend of CO2e over time and methodology of forecasting grid carbon intensity |
6.3. |
Grid Carbon Density Forecast (Market-Based, Kg/kWh): 2019-2035 |
6.4. |
Scope 2: Global Data Center Lifecycle CO2e (Market-based Method) Forecast: 2021-2035 |
6.5. |
Scope 2 and Scope 3 CO2e forecast (market-based): 2021-2035 |
6.6. |
Savings from carbon free energy forecast: 2025-2035 |
6.7. |
Carbon credits for data center forecast: 2023-2035 |
7. |
SUPPLEMENTARY FORECASTS |
7.1. |
Data Center Power and Electricity Forecast: 2013-2035 |
7.2. |
Historic Data of TDP - GPU |
7.3. |
TDP Trend: Historic Data and Forecast Data - CPU |
7.4. |
Data Center Power Forecast By Hyperscalers, Colocators, and Enterprise Users: 2013-2035 |
7.5. |
Technologies for cement decarbonization - megatonnes per annum of CO2 avoided (2025-2035) |
7.6. |
Carbon dioxide removal capacity forecast by technology (million metric tons of CO2 per year), 2024-2044 |
8. |
COMPANY PROFILES |
8.1. |
Decarbonized power generation: |
8.1.1. |
Ballard Power Systems |
8.1.2. |
Bloom Energy |
8.1.3. |
Ceres |
8.1.4. |
Fluence — Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) |
8.1.5. |
NuScale Power |
8.1.6. |
Plug Power |
8.1.7. |
Sage Geosystems |
8.2. |
Carbon dioxide removal: |
8.2.1. |
Airhive |
8.2.2. |
BC Biocarbon |
8.2.3. |
Captura |
8.2.4. |
Carbo Culture |
8.2.5. |
Carbofex |
8.2.6. |
CarbonBlue |
8.2.7. |
CarbonCapture Inc. |
8.2.8. |
Carbyon |
8.2.9. |
Equatic |
8.2.10. |
Graphyte |
8.2.11. |
Heirloom |
8.2.12. |
neustark |
8.2.13. |
Noya |
8.2.14. |
O.C.O Technology |
8.2.15. |
Phlair |
8.2.16. |
PyroCCS |
8.2.17. |
Takachar |
8.2.18. |
UNDO |
8.3. |
Decarbonized concrete and steel |
8.3.1. |
Aker Carbon Capture |
8.3.2. |
Ardent |
8.3.3. |
Biomason |
8.3.4. |
Cambridge Electric Cement |
8.3.5. |
Capsol Technologies |
8.3.6. |
Carbonaide |
8.3.7. |
Coolbrook |
8.3.8. |
HYBRIT |
8.3.9. |
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries: KM CDR Process |
8.3.10. |
Solidia Technologies |
8.3.11. |
Svante |
8.4. |
Data Center Cooling |
8.4.1. |
Accelsius — Two-Phase Direct-to-Chip Cooling |
8.4.2. |
Amazon AWS Data Center |
8.4.3. |
Arieca |
8.4.4. |
Asperitas Immersed Computing |
8.4.5. |
Calyos: Data Center Applications |
8.4.6. |
Engineered Fluids |
8.4.7. |
Green Revolution Cooling (GRC) |
8.4.8. |
Henkel: microTIM and data centers |
8.4.9. |
LiquidCool Solutions |
8.4.10. |
LiSAT |
8.4.11. |
Nano-Join |
8.4.12. |
NeoFan |
8.4.13. |
Neurok Thermocon Inc |
8.4.14. |
Parker Lord: Dispensable Gap Fillers |
8.4.15. |
Resonac Holdings |
8.4.16. |
Sumitomo Chemical Co., Ltd |
8.4.17. |
Taybo (Shanghai) Environmental Technology Co., Ltd |
8.4.18. |
Tyson |
8.4.19. |
Vertiv Holdings - Data Center Liquid Cooling |
8.4.20. |
ZutaCore |