Thames Water launches strike investigation of data centers on water supply in and around London as it prepares for a hose ban on its 15 million customers in drought-hit area This week.
The company that has faced sharp criticism over this is record on fixing leaks, started a “target exercise” to understand how lots of drinking water 24-hour facilities that produce huge quantities of heat — use cool their servers, given the scale and demand of places around the capital.
John Hernon, strategic development manager in Thames Water, said he ran review because of growing demand for data centers, in particular in Slough area set become second largest data center in in world.
“No need for data centers in use drinking quality water for cooling. We want look at how raw, non-potable water can be used and reused,” he said.
One proposed site in Slough recently applied for Permission to use 25 liters second although Thames Water disputed the request and was able to negotiate more on- on-site water storage reduce in demand added.
The sector in which faced barrier of criticism over high levels of more electricity it consumes using water cooling for cutting back on energy-intensive refrigeration units and reduce costs and emissions.
Sir Robert Goodwill MP, Conservative Chairman of house of Community environmentfood and rural affairs selection committee called for a government or a regulatory investigation into the impact of data centers on water reserves. “As more as well as more data centers spring up we need calculate out what will be their demands and what will be the consequences on other users,” he said.
A drought has been officially declared. in mid August after a lot of Great Britain, including London and its environs area and Thames water will bring in ban on the use of hoses on Wednesday. UK experiences driest summer yet for 50 years and farmers struggling to save your harvest.
Thames Water has been heavily criticized for this is record on leakage and pollution of sewage with this is network having lost almost quarter of the water he supplies, or more more than 600 million liters per day. The company said a leak is imminent over it’s 20,000 miles of pipes and what he fixed more over 1000 leaks every week.
Last month, the Financial Times reported developers in west london faced potential ban on new housing projects by 2035 because the electricity grid run out of ability support new homes – cluster of partly blamed data centers around west London.
The Greater London Authority said it “knows of large volume of electricity and water required for mileage of data centers” and that it works with utilities and local councils reduce their impact.
Gary Aitkenhead, senior vice president of operations in Equinix, one of largest data center companies in in the world, companies such as his faced “real voltage” between electricity and water use. He added what in warmer climate, with temperature is similar to that observed in This summer in London, water was usually the only viable way to reduce power consumption.
Jan Bitterlin, graduate engineer specializing in in data processing center power and cooling said switch Water cooling could cut data center power use by 20 percent.
“Data centers are not want to use rain or river water, because they must obtain an environmental license and will also need to be cleaned up firstsaid Bitterlin, explaining using untreated water can cause corrosion equipment or release disease. He added that the transition to using groundwater or river water cause other environmental problems by lowering the groundwater level.
He offered British water system was to blame for restrictions on food and what used to be much better set up for industrial levels of use.
