Microsoft has announced plans to build two new data centers in Sweden, which should be among the “most sustainable” data centers ever built. The buildings are powered by renewable energy sources only, with plans for zero waste operations.
The data centers are located in the cities of Gävle and Sandviken, north of Stockholm’s capital, writes Silicon Angle. The data centres receive energy from Vattenfall AB, which already sells energy to Microsoft, which is one hundred percent generated by the Wieringermeer Polder wind farm in the Netherlands. In addition, the two companies will work together to reduce the CO2 footprint of the new data centres to zero.
“We aim to make our data centers in Sweden two of the most sustainably designed and managed in the world with the ultimate ambition to achieve zero carbon operations,” said Noelle Walsh, vice president of cloud operations and innovation at Microsoft. “The data center we design contributes to Microsoft’s ongoing commitment to a sustainable, low-carbon future.
The Swedish data centres also have a practical use. Microsoft says it chose Sweden in anticipation of future demand for cloud and Internet services as demand in Europe continues to grow. Microsoft already has data centers in Europe in the countries Austria, France, Finland, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. It is also working on new data centres in Norway and Switzerland.
Other goals
Microsoft has had the goal of being as sustainable as possible for many years. In this way, the company once again emphasised that it has been a carbon-neutral company since 2012. In addition, the company wants 70 percent of all its data centres to be powered by renewable energy by 2023. In the end, it has to be 100%.
But the company’s objectives go further than just clean data centres. It also works with the Norwegian companies Agder Energi – a producer of renewable energy – and Powel AS, which provides software solutions for the utility sector to increase access to clean energy.
This news article was automatically translated from Dutch to give Techzine.eu a head start. All news articles after September 1, 2019 are written in native English and NOT translated. All our background stories are written in native English as well. For more information read our launch article.
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