Dr Bronwyn Cumbo

We've recently had a one gigawatt

um plan to develop out in western sydney so the equivalent energy that these things use they do require a lot of energy to do all their processing but also the cooling and the amount of water they require as well is also related to cooling so if you think about a computer and how it warms up throughout the day as it's doing the work a data center is essentially a large computer full of these server racks so you can imagine the amount of heat that these things are generating

Unfortunately, servers can't function when they get too hot.

So cooling is really important for data center efficiency.

They usually need to stay around 18 to 23, 24 degrees.

There are some engineers who are trying to look at ways to design server racks that can function at higher temperatures.

But essentially, we need the energy to keep the – there's two reasons for the energy in water.

First is we have air coolers.

So they're essentially air conditioners that run through and keep the air flowing.

But they also have water as a cooling process.

So water is 3,000 times more efficient at removing heat.

and depending on the design, they use a lot of water, depending on the design of the data centre.

So when you have evaporative cooling as your main mechanism, they're essentially using water, and it's mostly potable water at the moment, that runs through the system and then evaporates out of the data centre and essentially takes that heat out with it.

Some companies use what's called a closed-loop cooling system.

That's where they have a fixed amount of water, and so they're much more water efficient.

You'll see that in their data.

sustainability reporting.

But those companies also tend to use a lot more energy because they need to cool that water down to run it through the system again.

So they're relying on the energy to cool that system.

And what they do there is often offset the energy with renewable energy through things like power purchasing agreements.