A non-profit eco-organisation for children has created a data centre that is exceptionally small while also hugely energy efficient.

Working with Dell, Nortel, Pillar and VMware, Earth Rangers developed a data centre that’s only 9.3 square meters in size — about 10 times smaller than it might have been using a more conventional approach. The facility also reduces energy consumption by about 111,000 kilowatt-hours per year, the equivalent of cutting carbon dioxide emissions by more than 26 metric tonnes.

In addition, the daily computing energy required — about 100 kilowatt-hours — will be offset by a 28-kilowatt photovoltaic array.

“The data centre is an extremely impressive achievement,” says Aaron Hay, a research consultant at Info-Tech Research Group. “It is clear Earth Rangers took the time to plan holistically, rather than attack the server room piecemeal. I hope businesses who tour the site will rip a page right from this playbook.”

In the future, the organisation also plans to use heat from the data centre’s cooling equipment to provide hot water and heat throughout the building.

Tags: Data centres