APAC to Pass World Average for Data Centre Power Consumption
APAC to Pass World Average for Data Centre Power Consumption
December 17, 2007: With the release of a new study detailing a significant and rapid rise data centre energy usage around the globe, AMD has put out a call to its industry partners to hasten their efficiency efforts, particularly in the Asia/Pacific where the growing power use is outstripping world averages.
Conducted by Jonathan Koomey, Ph.D. and based on data from the industry analytical firm IDC, the study documented and grouped energy use in five regions, namely the United States, Western Europe, Japan, Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan) and the rest of the world.
It has forecasted that while data centre energy consumption in the U.S. will decline relative to consumption worldwide by 2010 (40 percent of the worldwide total in 2000 to around one-third), the Asia/Pacific region will increase its share from 10 percent to about 16 percent.
According to the study, electricity use APAC grew at a 23 percent annually compared to a world average of 16 percent. This means that the absolute electricity consumption for servers in the Asia/Pacific region could more than double between 2005 and 2010, requiring electricity capacity equal to output from two new 1000 MW power plants. For the entire world, server consumption from 2005 to 2010 would require additional capacity equal to more than 10 additional 1000 MW power plants.
AMD says that making modest changes in the way data centres are run, such as turning on available power management features, enabling higher rates of resource consolidation, shutting off unused servers and improving infrastructure operations, can easily translate to a 20 percent reduction in power use, or put another way, save the amount of energy output from five 1000 MW power plants.
“With the findings released today we can begin to take next steps, including examining how we can power datacenters around the world while addressing impacts on global climate,” said Larry Vertal, senior strategist for AMD Green. “For example, coal currently provides 25 percent of global primary energy needs and generates 40 percent of the world's electricity.
“Clearly, we must work harder than ever to not only deliver more efficient server and cooling technology, but also just as importantly, to work with our industry and government partners to develop environmentally sustainable solutions in areas where we see the most dramatic increases in energy use.”
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