Carbon Trust touts low-energy datacentre design

The Carbon Trust is cutting emissions in Lockerbie

The Carbon Trust is teaming up with a firm called Lockerbie Data Centres to design and build a low-carbon datacentre just outside the Scottish town that could provide a model for enterprises looking to slash their emissions.

The Carbon Trust estimates that the Lockerbie facility will emit more than 200,000 tonnes of CO2 less per year than a conventional datacentre of the same size.

Hugh Jones, director for solutions at the Carbon Trust, said, “Along with the ever-increasing demand for data storage comes an ever-increasing demand for energy to power and cool UK datacentres. Low carbon design in new build and refurbishment projects has the potential to unlock hundreds of millions of pounds in energy bills each year.”

David King, project director at the Lockerbie Data Centre, added that with the cost of electricity rising and growing client concern over the size of their carbon footprints, "increasing the energy efficiency of datacentres was a fundamental design consideration".

"We have employed the Carbon Trust’s design advice to significantly reduce energy use, and to put wasted heat to good use - by providing low carbon heating to other commercial spaces being built on the site,” he said.

The facility will cover 272,000m² and accommodate up to 50,000 server racks, with a peak power demand of 300MW.

“When complete, each of the datacentre’s 40 modules will use around half as much energy as a conventional datacentre of the same size – creating savings of around £2.1m per annum per module - or £85m per annum across the whole Lockerbie development,” he added.

The facility will use "natural cooling" from its surroundings to help save energy and will harvest waste heat for reuse, King said.