Credit: Digital Realty
Digital Realty has introduced a new cooling tower initiative at its SIN10 data centre in Singapore which aims to improve water conservation and efficiency.
Employing a process known as DCI electrolysis, Digital Realty eliminated the use of chemicals to treat blow-down water discharge – water that is drained from cooling equipment to remove mineral build-up – from the cooling towers in its chiller systems.
According to Digital Realty, the process allowed the data centre to “triple the number of times” the same pool of water can be used at its SIN10 cooling towers before it is discharged as wastewater, which it claims resulted in 1.24 million litres of water saved monthly.
Since the implementation of DCI electrolysis in February, Digital Realty claims it has reduced monthly blow-down water discharge at SIN10 by 90 per cent.
What’s more, water usage efficiency (WUE) at SIN10 has improved by 15 per cent – a step towards the Singapore Public Utilities Board’s (PUB) industry benchmark of 2.6 Cu.m/MWh for data centres by 30 per cent.
Beyond water conservation, Digital Realty claims SIN10’s electricity requirements have decreased due to minimal mineral build-up in the cooling towers, enabling the overall cooling system to “run more effectively”.
It also believes the risk of polluting Singapore’s water systems is also minimised, with “cleaner wastewater” being discharged from the cooling towers.
“Digital Realty is committed to minimising the environmental impact of data centres,” said Jon Curry, Vice President of Operations APAC at Digital Realty. “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.
“The 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. Sustainability will always be at the core of our business as we continue working toward building and maintaining data centres that maximise our customers’ growth while minimising our environmental impact.”
In February, the data centre operator committed to two renewable energy initiatives in Asia Pacific that aimed to contribute to its global carbon emissions reduction targets. This included installing solar panels at its SIN11 data centre in Singapore, with a similar solar energy project planned for its SIN12 data centre.
