The business centers business is being transformed as companies are digitized and the industry is assuming a more relevant role in digital society and economics.In a recent article, Data Center Frontier experts deepen the evolution that the sector is following and describe the eight trends that will have more impact on data centers in 2022.
Influence of climate change in the selection of locations
The first step for the construction of a new data center is the choice of adequate location, a process in which a series of main factors have traditionally been taken into account, such as land price, proximity to interconnection nodesand potential customers, and the availability of basic resources such as water or energy.But as climate change has been showing its effects, operators and industry investors are adding other factors in their evaluation of the right place, such as the availability of renewable energy or concerns about water shortage.
A recent report by the real estate consultant CBRE reveals that environmental considerations will have a growing effect on the process of choice of locations to build new data centers, which will benefit markets where there is a greater abundance of non -polluting energy.And this trend will be reinforced by the development difficulties that are being seen in locations of high concentration of data centers.
Other factors linked to climate change and sustainability that will affect the choice of locations is the incidence of extreme meteorological effects, such as droughts, storms and floods.In recent years, these types of problems in regions have begun to register where they did not occur before, making investors of the data centers to potentially more safer locations flee.
More effort to increase resilience and guarantee activity time
Interruptions are a serious problem for data centers and as companies adopt hybrid IT architectures it is more complex to guarantee activity times.To achieve this, it is necessary to apply backup and commutation strategies by error that take into account the cloud infrastructure, in placement centers, perimeter locations and the main data center.Experts highlight that in 2021 serious interruptions were produced in the services of important data centers operators that questioned existing strategies.
This article echoes the annual report on interruptions in data centers from the Uptime Institute, where its experts say that “as the world becomes more dependent on IT services, reliability will receive greater scrutiny and require additional improvements".They explain that the number of blackouts has descended, but the consequences of the interruptions remain increasing.They comment that “applications are often composed of many disparate components and services.As a result, IT interruptions have become less binary: failures are usually partial and depend on user configurations ”.
And they put as an example the interruptions suffered by Fastly or AWS, which have led business clients to question the validity of cloud operators strategies and other online services.As a result of these problems, companies will optimize their architectures to be able to better resist third -party interruptions, both in the cloud and on the edge and the nucleus itself.
Mergers and acquisitions in the supply chain of data centers
Data centers and operators are very striving to not suffer serious problems in their supply chain, using a wide variety of strategies to successfully manage these risks.But the opinion is extending that delays in the supply chain and the shortage of labor will be aggravated in 2022.In the CBRE report they refer to in this article, which shows the forecasts for this year, experts say that “interruptions in the supply chain could affect the development of the data center and delay the delivery of new supplies”.
And they add that “as uncertainty is coming in the midst of restrictions related to pandemic for markets outside the US, particularly in Pacific Asia, the shortage of materials and the increase in delays in shipments to the ports ofThe US has the potential to delay the development of new facilities and affect the update cycles of data centers.These delays could increase costs, potentially raising income in affected markets between 4% and 6% ”.
To face this situation, experts believe that there will.Many of these agreements were due to the search for greater vertical integration by companies in the sector, which sought to increase their competitiveness by acquiring suppliers or technology.An example of this is the announcement made by Iron Mountain in December, about its intention to buy Itrenew, a company dedicated to dismantling data centers and recycling its IT assets.
More investment in regional markets and on the edge
In the past, large data centers focused on increasing capacity in the main locations worldwide, such as Ashburn, Frankfurt, London or Dublin.But the progressive decentralization of the industry is raising interest in other markets where there are good growth prospects, and experts believe that in 2022 the investment in locations considered second level will increase.An example of this is the growth that is being seen in cities such as Madrid, and in other emerging interconnection nodes and data centers.
On the other hand, many industries are changing their infrastructure model towards distributed IT architectures, betting on computing on the edge to provide services closer to the source of data and end users.Experts expect this year to increase considerably the deployment of EDGE data centers.
More liquid cooling in data centers
After many years of being considered a niche technology in the sector, liquid cooling is finding its place again in the data centers, and in 2022 important movements are expected in this regard.On the one hand, the need for high -power hardware for artificial intelligence work loads forces more effective ways to refrigerate the equipment.On the other, the pressure is increasing to eliminate the use of water for servers cooling systems.And important advances in liquid cooling by placement and cloud operators are also being made, supported by servers and chips manufacturers.
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In this context, it is increasing interest in new refrigeration technologies by immersion, cooling in two phases and other interesting proposals, in addition to direct cooling to chip, which has multiple applications.So much so that these liquid cooling modalities are also part of open infrastructure projects for data centers, such as Open19, and are starting to be used in important facilities of large placement and hyperscale operators.
Another area where many see great possibilities for liquid cooling is in EDGE data centers, although there are still many challenges to be resolved before it is considered as a priority option.In any case, different possibilities are currently being explored to cool perimeter infrastructure, both with direct liquid cooling to chip and immersive refrigeration based on chassis.
Popular opposition to industry growth
Although they are the basis of the digital ecosystems that surround us, the perception that data centers generate a negative impact on the communities where they are built is extending among the population.Experts say that if this idea sits, it could slow the growth of the sector in the main markets, where there is greater saturation and the problems associated with data centers are more clearly manifested.
Examples of this are being seen at different key points of the industry in Europe, among other regions, where by popular and political pressure they are slowing down and even paralyzing the projects of new data centers.In the last three years there have been important cases such as Amsterdam and, more recently, Dublin's, and it is expected that this pressure to control the growth of the industry in the main urban nuclei will continue.
To respond to this growing threat, many operators are changing their approach to prioritizing sustainability, investing in renewable energy, in an increasingly efficient IT and in environmental policies and actions to compensate for their carbon footprint.Some are also investing in the energy industry itself and even building their own renewable energy generating plants to contribute to the food of their facilities.And a trend that is being installed in certain countries is the search for ways to take advantage of the residual heat of data centers to provide heating to nearby populations or industries, especially in the coldest countries in northern Europe.
In any case, the bad image that data centers are acquiring is a difficult problem to combat, and experts believe that in 2022 it will be more difficult to foresee their impact on the development of new projects.Because more and more cases occur in which a construction obtains the permits, but subsequently social and political pressure ends up paralyzing them or forcing to redefine plans to adapt to higher requirements.
New forms of energy
One of the biggest challenges facing the Datacenter industry is in the energy supply, and some of the main companies in the sector have been exploring new forms of energy for years, both for the main food and for backup systems.The first thing was to look for alternatives for the classic diesel generators, and firms like Microsoft have been working on different possibilities, such as hydrogen fuel cells.Others are exploring the possibility of using new generation batteries that allow the surplus to be stored for use in case of emergency.
As for the main energy, many operators are going to renewable energies, making long -term purchases in the regions where there is more availability of clean energy.In 2022 experts expect the industry to enter a new stage in regard to energy consumption, looking for more solid alliances with renewable suppliers to reduce their carbon footprint.
Meanwhile, the use of what is called micro -re -infrastructure, infrastructure that provides access to multiple energy sources, including the public network, energy storage, emergency generators and generators of solar or wind energy generators, is extended.This diversification allows data centers to operate independently to the main network in case of blackouts or when there is excessive pressure on the main network.They also help to have a more granular management of the cost of energy, helping to reduce the general spending of the data center.
Increasing influence of metaverso in data centers
The possibilities offered by metaversus will revolutionize many digital ecosystems and in 2022 the impact that this new concept in the data centers will begin to be seen in 2022.To realize this vision, it is necessary.The main technological experts claim that it is necessary.
And, more importantly, it is that the so -appointed metoverso is not based on a few locations, but that a wide global network of data hectters focused on this new technological paradigm must be built.There are even those who affirm that an increase of 1 is required.000% in current computer efficiency.This assumes that industry companies involved in the development of metoverso, and not only the goal itself (Facebook), must invest in computer, storage and data centers networks and interconnection networks of new generation.
In addition, this connected infrastructure network must combine resources in the cloud with local high -power devices, latest generation computer networks and even have the support of computing markets distributed in real time to be able to meet the requirements ofPower on demand.And it also pointed out that liquid cooling could become a requirement for high performance infrastructure focused on metovers.
In this article, Data Center Frontier researchers also indicates other trends that will take effect on the data centers from 2022.On the one hand, there is the arrival of satellite TI networks and infrastructure, which will begin to be part of the global and cloud interconnection network.There is also the progress of technologies such as Blockchain and Web3, which despite being sold as highly decentralized continue to depend on traditional cloud infrastructure and data centers.Finally, they emphasize that the expansion of artificial intelligence models based on large data sets will require significant investments in storage and computer hardware in the facilities.
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