Digital Realty makes DC sustainability breakthrough

Cloud and data centre colocation provider Digital Realty has made a new breakthrough in data centre sustainability with the deployment of a new cooling tower initiative at its SIN10 data centre in Singapore.

The initiative involves employing a process known as DCI electrolysis to treat blow-down water discharge in place of chemicals, tripling the number of times the same pool of water can be used at the facility’s cooling towers before it is discharged as wastewater.

Implementing the technique has helped Digital Realty reduce monthly blow-down water discharge at SIN10 by 90%, improving water usage efficiency at the facility by 15%. This is a 30% improvement on the Singapore Public Utilities Board’s industry benchmark for data centres.

The initiative joins a raft of other sustainability initiatives implemented by Digital Realty which have reduced the company’s global water intensity by 7%. This has helped contribute to the company’s target of reducing Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 68% and Scope 3 emissions by 24% by 2030.

APAC VP of Operations Jon Curry said this demonstrates the company’s commitment to minimising the environmental impact of data centres.

“This cooling tower initiative showcases how water usage can become far more efficient, and we hope this sets the standard for other data centres to follow,” he said.

“This project has yielded very promising results, and we intend to extend this initiative to our other two data centres in Singapore (SIN11 and SIN12) and do our part to optimise resource use in the industry.”

Image credit: iStock.com/Daniel Megias