More data, less energy?

The Swiss Datacenter Efficiency Association (SDEA) campaigns for greater energy efficiency – particularly in IT – in datacenters. Its director, Matthias Haymoz, explains the importance of measuring performance in a context where demand for this type of infrastructure will continue to grow.

Interview published in French on espazium.ch

espazium magazine: Your association's objective is well summarized in your slogan: “Datacenter efficiency and emissions: measured, not guessed.” To measure this efficiency, you have created a label that goes beyond traditional indices and operators' “green” rhetoric.

Matthias Haymoz: Indeed, today, the energy performance of datacenters is measured by isolated, and therefore insufficient, indices, notably the universal PUE index. And the publication of efficiency indicators remains largely voluntary, particularly in Switzerland. There is therefore a gap between the sustainability promises made by operators and verifiable results.

With this label, we have tried to take a comprehensive view of energy efficiency and CO₂ emissions by creating an index that includes not only PUE, but also residual heat, IT (servers, storage, network), the carbon footprint of the energy used, and soon water use. We also wanted greater transparency with this certification, which cannot be bought and offers independent recognition to organizations that are prepared to prove their efficiency using data measured and validated by an external auditor. Nine labels have been awarded in Switzerland so far, and we are expanding into other countries. For example, this year we certified the first datacenter in the EU, located in Luxembourg.

Do existing datacenters in Switzerland and elsewhere still have a long way to go in terms of energy efficiency?

Colocation operators are generally very efficient because, for them, energy efficiency is a business case: since energy costs them millions of francs – we're talking gigawatts – they are careful not to use more than they need.

For us, the greatest room for improvement is not in the datacenters themselves, but among their customers (banks, cantons, SMEs, etc.). In a modern, efficient center, 80% of the energy is consumed by IT (servers, storage), which is the responsibility of the customers. This is where action needs to be taken. Today, according to IBM estimates, a server is used at an average of 12-18% of its capacity, whereas it could safely be increased to 80%.

Until now, IT efficiency has not been a topic of discussion. The focus has always been on buildings and embedded carbon. With the growth of AI, we are beginning to ask ourselves: how much energy do we use for servers, storage, and networks?

How can we improve this IT efficiency?

Improvement starts with measurement. Today, in large companies, thousands of servers are underutilized and no one knows it because the sustainable development and IT departments often do not talk to each other. Yet optimizing IT infrastructure could be a significant source of savings for them: less energy consumed, fewer licenses, less software, etc.

We are not here to tell operators that they consume too much energy, because datacenters remain the backbone of industry, but to alert them: if you use one gigawatt of energy, make sure it is not wasted on unused servers or empty storage.

Infomaniak's latest datacenter, located in a new neighborhood in Plan-les-Ouates, recycles its heat by feeding it back into the district heating network. Is this an attractive option?

Absolutely! Recovering waste heat to heat nearby apartments or businesses is essential. But it has to be feasible, and it is up to planners and municipalities to identify areas where datacenters can recover this heat. Too many centers are built in fields, far from urban areas, where the energy produced is wasted... To facilitate connections between networks and stakeholders, intermediaries are beginning to emerge, such as Energy 360° in Zurich. But there is still a lot to be done in Switzerland.

Are there any regulations in Switzerland on datacenters?

Not yet. Several interpellations to the Federal Council calling for regulation have gone unheeded. In the canton of Zurich, the 2022 Energy Act stipulates that every industrial entity that uses a certain amount of energy must make its residual heat “available.” But someone still has to want it. There is also a technical issue: the heat often leaves the datacenter at 25 or 30°C, but must be raised to 80 or 90°C to be integrated into a district heating network (DHN).

The electricity requirements of datacenters are such that tensions are arising on the electricity grids in some countries. Is this the case in Switzerland?

Not in the immediate future. Datacenters are estimated to account for 5-6% of national energy consumption. By 2030, this could rise to 15%, which would mean an increase of one gigawatt in the energy required in Switzerland. According to Axpo, apart from 250 hours per year, the Swiss grid can easily deliver enough energy for these centers. This is not the case in other parts of the world. Amsterdam, Dublin, Frankfurt, and Singapore, for example, have in various ways frozen or restricted new datacenter projects due to combined constraints related to electricity, grid capacity, land, and environmental impact.

Is the Swiss market still set to grow?

In Europe, the Tier 1 market consists of the “FLAPD” cities: Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, Paris, and Dublin. Next come the emerging markets (Tier 2): Zurich, Milan, and Madrid. Switzerland is very attractive for operators: political stability, low risk of earthquakes, favorable non-EU legislation, reliable network, even if energy is not cheap... But while the country has many assets, it has little land available for large projects.

Nevertheless, the Zurich region remains very attractive because it is well connected and all the major players (Microsoft, Google, Meta, Amazon) have their regional headquarters there. Between 2021 and 2024, the surface area of datacenters in the region doubled from 63,000 m² (28 datacenters) to 114,700 m² (30). In the future, the trend will be toward expanding existing datacenter campuses rather than building new sites.

Can we try to look ahead a little? Do we currently have the means to anticipate technological needs and developments?

It is extremely difficult to have a vision, even in the short term. Three or four years ago, we could not have imagined where we would be today with Generative AI. In the future, we will probably not need fewer datacenters, but studies suggest that instead of building huge buildings for servers, we could imagine modular datacenters, small boxes that can be installed anywhere, more compact and closer to users.