Tier III data center, with 100% green IT through hydropower and free cooling
The delegation of the GERMAN DATACENTER ASSOCIATION was warmly welcomed at midday on 24th September at Stavanger Airport. From there, it went directly to the Green Mountain Datacenters: The award-winning Tier III DC1-Stavanger data center in Rennesøy is built over several floors into a mountain. The GDA delegation was particularly impressed by the natural conditions, the efficient power supply by hydropower and the cooling: the data center has access to 100% renewable energy and free cooling through the water of the adjacent fjord 365 days a year.
The joint dinner with representatives from Green Mountains, Lefdal Mine Datacenter, Invest in Norway and ICT Norway provided a lively exchange of experience, industry knowledge and trends.
Norway's government supports data center industry through tax cuts and special DC strategy
On the morning of September 25, Bjørn Rønning, head of the Norwegian Data Center Forum at ICT Norway, and Benedicte Fasmer Waaler, Invest in Norway, introduced the delegation to the Norwegian data center industry and the Norwegian data center ecosystem. The Norway travelers learned that the local government recognized the potential of the data center industry and developed strategies to support and promote data center operators. For example, the energy tax for data centers was lowered in 2016, a property tax reform for data center equipment was initiated in 2018, and a data center strategy was developed to further improve the framework conditions (taxes, energy, infrastructure). The electricity price in Norway is by far the lowest in the European comparison and - noteworthy - the electricity is green: 98% of the electricity in Norway is produced by 1550 hydroelectric power plants and 25 wind farms.
An opportunity for more sustainability?
Conditions that could benefit the whole of Europe: "Increased cooperation within the data center industry, across borders, could be the key to increased sustainability and healthy growth for the European data center industry," said Benedicte Fasmer Waaler. In particular, she means that less latency-sensitive data or High Performance Computing projects could be outsourced to Norwegian data centers - a practice that German companies such as cloud provider iNNOVO Cloud and carmaker VW are already using today. The lecture of the hosts was followed by good discussions and a lively exchange of all present.
