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Data centre sustainability and the targets of the European Green Deal
According to Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Commission, the European Green Deal would represent the continent's "man on the moon moment". The signing of the European Green Deal was a critical moment in the sustainability efforts of not only data centres, but the entirety of Europe. In this month’s timeline, we explore the influence that this deal has had on the industry, and the pioneering achievements of Europe’s data centres – both after the deal was formed and predating this initiative.
Iomart
The Scottish cloud and IT company iomart was one of the first in Europe – and, indeed, the world – to reach carbon neutrality. In 2007, it achieved the carbon neutral status for its English data centre – a feat that was reached long before this sustainability metric was the focus of popular discussion.
The Climate Neutral Data Centre Pact is formed
In advance of the European Green Deal, the Climate Neutral Data Centre Pact was established to provide Europe’s data centre industry with a clear path to sustainability. The self-regulated initiative implemented a number of goals – spanning energy efficiency, green power and heat reuse – including an agreement to make data centres climate neutral by 2030.
industry launched its Climate Neutral Data Centre Pact. This landmark pact has been signed by over 25 key players in Europe’s data centre industry, including the likes of Google, Equinix, and Iron Mountain. This represents both a key advancement towards the European Green Deal targets, and a clear indication of the shared focus of Europe’s data centres.
2019
Signing the European Green Deal
The European Green Deal was approved in 2020 and marked the launch of the European Commission’s pioneering new policy initiatives. The core goal established by this deal was to make the EU climate neutral by 2050.
2020
Equinix achieves 100%
renewables for its EMEA data centres
In the same year as the formation of the Green Deal, the global data centre giant Equinix announced that it had successfully achieved 100% renewable energy usage across all of its EMEA data centres.
