Recycled Data Center Heat
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Recycling Data Centers' Heat Could Be an Environmental Win-Win / Axios
Data centers account for about 1% of the world’s electricity use, and a whole lot of that energy is ultimately converted into waste heat (the computers in these data centers work hard and generate a lot of heat as a consequence of that work—that heat eventually piped out into the environment).
This is a pain for the folks running these data centers, as they have to cool these systems to keep them running.
It’s also a pain for energy grids, which are often spread thin during winter months when these data center energy-hogs are gobbling up a significant chunk of local energy resources when that energy is needed to heat homes and businesses.
Some cities in Sweden and Norway (alongside corporations like Amazon) have been experimenting with funneling the heat from data centers into cities to be used for, well, heating things (like homes and businesses).
A new partnership between a Swedish energy company and the Swedish government has set the goal of producing 10% of Stockholm’s heating needs using recycled heat by 2035, and a commercial park in Norway is building out this capacity (to funnel heat from data centers) from the beginning.
Also: How much does our food contribute to global warming?
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