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Locating data centers in an energy-constrained world

Summary:

Globally data centers are currently buying $30 billion of power per year, but changes in the power market are rippling through the Internet industry, altering both the location of data centers and their sources of power. This report parses the many complications of picking a data center location, which we call data-center siting. Siting includes considerations beyond the geographic location, such as how to procure energy and green-energy models, all to run better on a new, ever-shifting energy infrastructure. This report will help decision makers like CIOs and data-center planners weigh the most important parameters behind locating new data centers, whether in the U.S. or globally. Doing so will lead to more cost-effective, reliable and sustainable data centers.

  1. Table of contents                                                                                                           
  2. Executive summary                                                                                                    
  3. Considerations when locating a data center                                            
  4. The new priorities and metrics for selecting a data-center location       
    1. Energy (costs, transmission, redundancy, fuel mix, growth)                             
    2. Fiber connectivity and latency                                                                                
    3. Other considerations: climate and cooling, natural disasters, taxes            
  5. Power-market characteristics driving data-center siting             
    1. Green data centers: attractions and obstacles                                                  
    2. Very mixed access to power (transmission availability and congestion)     
    3. Power-price differences and unpredictability                                                     
  6. Renewable energy and its impact on data-center siting                    
    1. Price stability                                                                                                             
    2. The data-network factor in data-center siting                                                     
  7. Business ramification of latency on competitiveness                        
    1. Supply chain options: power plant, utility and data center                               
  8. International: locating data centers overseas                                    
    1. Government policies? Data privacy? Legally permissible tracking, country risk
    2. Iceland: pure green and low-cost power                                                             
    3. New Zealand                                                                                                            
  9. Case study: Google carves its own path for renewables               
    1. Google’s goals                                                                                                         
    2. Power-market selection                                                                                         
    3. Actual Google energy model                                                                                 
  10. Recommendations                                                                                                    
    1. Data center planners                                                                                              
    2. Renewable-energy developers                                                                             
    3. Municipalities, government units                                                                          
    4. IT buyers of managed services                                                                            
  11. Further reading                                                                                                        
  12. About  Martin Piszczalski
  13. About GigaOM Pro