It was fascinating listening to Derick William and Dr. Veronika Shabunko talking about sustainable data centers at DCD in Singapore, a topic which is no doubt close to all our hearts, and appropriate in the heat and haze of Asia last week.

The provision of a recognised scoring system for data centers (such as LEED) could be a ‘powerful’ (very poor pun) addition to our sector. We as developers, operators, builders and tenants must embrace such initiatives. This could provide a market for the requirement, putting a new set of tyres on the racing car (tenuous Singapore F1 GP link) that is data center development, allowing greater control and more focus in an area. Some really good points are made in the talk, and post-lecture questions focused on planning to use these measuring devices from the earliest stage in the project, communicating them well and ensuring efficiency in design, such that costs of implementation can be controlled.

Sometimes it’s just about getting the basics right.

Moving into PV, and Dr Shabunko talking through the benefits of PV use application. Perhaps no surprise that China is leading the charge in providing PV solar capacity, and possibly equally unsurprising that we see Germany topping the tables of efficiency and solar per capita. Singapore’s super low energy programme (SLE) is being applied to data centers, a great move by this city state in driving sustainable development performance, no doubt stimulating the commitment from major tech companies to source power from renewable sources..

We saw examples of floating data centers in the pipeline in this exciting city, floating solar farms, and renewable power procurement opportunities which will provide us with the chance to provide elegant solutions to our clients in APAC and Europe. The enigmatic Dr. Shabunko then showed us some PV solutions being employed in Singapore, including facades, of course roof tops and again, those floating farms of solar panels, presenting some interesting questions on long term performance…

All in all, a fascinating couple of hours, spent with thought leaders, innovators, common sense practitioners, and a room full of folks who want to provide sustainable and long term solutions to the industry, hurray! The future is bright…and hopefully a little less hazy, metaphorically and physically here in Asia.

P.S. top tip – if you want to make a positive contribution now, delete a few unused apps on your phone… they are taking valuable storage space, power etc. Let’s save the cloud for all those useful applications (Tetris is now gone from my phone!)