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LAST UPDATE | 18 Feb
NEW DATA CENTRES will be required to have generators or storage, either on-site or nearby, that can match its level of demand as a backup.
This is in an effort to ensure that new data centres won’t put additional pressure on existing electricity supplies.
Last year, The Journal Investigates found that backup and emergency generators attached to data centres in Ireland are releasing huge quantities of carbon dioxide emissions.
Our investigation found that over 135,000 tonnes of CO2 was emitted from these centres in the last five years from generators not on the electricity grid.
This amount of CO2 is comparable to running roughly 33,750 cars for a year in terms of the climate pollution produced.
The proposed new rules for the industry will be published today by the Commission for Regulation of Utilities (CRU).
The CRU said data centre demand growth to date has been heavily concentrated around the Dublin area, which has contributed to creating localised pressure on the electricity network.
New data centres seeking to connect to the grid will also be required to participate in the market and provide power to homes and businesses.
And while future data centres will be required to report on their emissions and the use of renewable energy, data centres will be allowed to use fossil-fuels.
The CRU said it is “trying to strike a balance between a number of competing demands and issues”.
“We are providing clarity to the sector on how it can connect to the grid over the coming years,” CRU Commissioner Dr Tanya Harrington told RTÉ’s Morning Ireland.
Harrington added that the CRU is asking ESB and EirGrid to collate data in order to show where the grid is constrained, “so that those investing will have a clear picture of where they can easily connect to the system or where there are constraints”.
She added that the draft decision is “working towards the government’s twin objectives of decarbonisation and digitalisation”.
However, Harrington said that it is a “matter for the data centres themselves to choose how they fuel and power themselves”.
“We’re requiring them to participate in the market, and that means that the most efficient plant, the cleanest plant, gets dispatched first,” she added.
“So there’s a number of incentives to try and incentivise the data centres who are constructing to do it in the greenest fashion possible.”
Research from University College Cork in December found that electricity demand from data centres has grown at an annual rate of almost 23% since 2015.
Electricity demand of other sectors, including transport, residential and commercial, and public services, grew by less than 0.5% over the same period.
It’s estimated that the data centre sector will continue to grow in the coming years, with demand from contracted data centres projected to increase from 21% of national electricity demand in 2023 to 30% by 2032.
Harrington said she understands these concerns but added that “our climate objectives are very ambitious, and we are working to develop an abundant source of renewable energy off the west coast of Ireland and bring that onshore”.
However, she said this will “take some time because we have to build the infrastructure to do that, which is why investment in the grid is so important”.
She added that progressing “both onshore and grid reinforcement supports will leave us in a situation where we have a greater abundance of renewable energy”.
Harrington further remarked that the draft decision “tries to meet our emissions targets and ensure there’s a continued investment in what is the enabling infrastructure for a knowledge rich economy”.
The CRU said it has “engaged heavily with stakeholders”.
“This is a draft decision, so it’s out for public consultation for six weeks, and we very much look forward to receiving the feedback from the industry,” said Harrington.
Unsure of what exactly is happening with the earth’s climate? Check out our FactCheck Knowledge Bank for essential reads and guides to finding good information online.
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future data centre should be banned unless they pay for their own source of energy and maintenance, independently of the grid.
@Dominic Leleu: Independently of the grid? How does that work? Should data centers have their own in-built nuclear power stations, or would you prefer they burn coal?
@Jason Memail: they should have their own wind turbines. There are several companies in Cork harbour each have their own huge wind turbine. It should be mandatory for data centres.
@Padraig: If it was possible that wind turbines alone could provide enough power to consistently run a data centre (it’s not), why wouldn’t companies build them today instead of buying electricity from the grid?
@Padraig: So when you need information stored files from a data centre they will say “The answer is blowing in the wind”
@Jason Memail: I know that. But they need to making a big contribution to their own power.
@Dominic Leleu: How about solving the problem rather than trying to block freedom of speech provided by information technology. “Designed in the late 1960s to meet increasing demand for electricity from the expanding economy, the plant’s job was to deliver instantaneous power to support households across the State as more people started switching on cookers and lights and firing up home heating systems.
From the outset, Turlough Hill could ramp up to full power of 292MW in just 70 seconds, enough electricity for 300,000 homes, ensuring the State system could keep up with rising demand for electricity at peak times.
At night, when demand for electricity is at its lowest, the water is pumped back up through the hill to refill the upper lake.”
@thomas molloy: Turlough Hill is on a twice daily cycle, 250MW down, 350MW pump back up. All done “in house” by the ESB off the Moneypoint coal. Wind power is just a complete and very expensive waste of time Subsidy Harvesting and wont financially carry supplying storage for free. There is only one way to power data centres and that’s SMRs. If we dont have them here, then it makes no difference to Climate Change, if they are somewhere else.. No one baring the French will be meeting their Paris obligations. Ger real.
@Jason Memail: wouldn’t be entertaining a silly comment.
Should have been this way from the start. Zero common sense!
@John Paul Long: agreed. Pure lunacy and yet I can’t cut a bit of turf. That’s the Greens for ya.
@Fergus O’Donnell: i thought the whole thing was you can cut turf, you just can’t sell it commercially?
@Fergus O’Donnell: The article says generators at Data Centres emitted 125,000 tonnes CO2 over 3 years, or 41,666 tonnes per year. This is 0.1% of national emissions (50 to 55 million tonnes CO2 per year).
On the other hand, the dairy sector emissions increased 95% over 20 years, by an extra 2.4 million tonnes CO2 equivalent per year (more than 50 times the CO2 emissions from the generators at data centres), and this comes with the additional cost of polluting Irish rivers and putting African farmers out of business. But you can talk negatively of farming. It’s almost like data centres are used as a distraction from noticing larger and more polluting sectors.
Data centres are a problem, I don’t deny this. But it’s not CO2 emissions, it’s their expanding use of electricity.
The fụck’s the point of going green if these big corpos just completely offsets all efforts while we’re being taxed to death for it on top if it!!?
@Kieran Menon: OPTICS
@Kieran Menon: backhanders and optics. Usual pigs at the trough.
@Kieran Menon: that is the point. It’s a compete scam.
@Kieran Menon: The article says generators at Data Centres emitted 125,000 tonnes CO2 over 3 years, or 41,666 tonnes per year. This is 0.1% of national emissions (50 to 55 million tonnes CO2 per year).
@Kieran Menon: who’s going green? ireland are one of the biggest polluters per capita in europe.
Please mr Facebook twitter amazon…please look like your doing something so we can make it look like we’re doing something…please sir ..you don’t have to ..thank you sir.thank you very much sir…
@David Cotter: why not use apple taxes for capital spending to build hydro electric generators. The Shannon hydroelectric Scheme was a major development by the Irish Free State in the 1920s to harness the power of the River Shannon. Its product, the Ardnacrusha power plant, is a hydroelectric power station located near Ardnacrusha within County Clare approximately 2.4 kilometres (1.5 mi) from the Limerick border. It is Ireland’s largest river hydroelectric scheme and is operated on a purpose built headrace connected to the River Shannon. The plant includes fish ladders so that returning fish, such as salmon, can climb the river safely past the power station.
@thomas molloy: Ardnacrusha generates 80MW at full power. e.g. for 60% of the year. Our present average load is over 5000MW., increasing fast. A SMR like the whole World are suddenly on about, is around 300MW. The great guru of Global Warming, Prof.James Hansen now says the whole issue is coming on far faster than they predicted and the only way to counter it is with a mass move into Nuclear.
The article says generators at Data Centres emitted 125,000 tonnes CO2 over 3 years, or 41,666 tonnes per year. This is 0.1% of national emissions (50 to 55 million tonnes CO2 per year).
On the other hand, 37.8% of national CO2 eq. emissions is from agriculture (2023 figures), and substantial proportion of this is from the dairy sector.
Emissions from the dairy sector increased 95% between 2000 and 2017, mostly attributed to the abolition of the EU milk quota and subsequent massive expansion of the dairy herd. Dairy emissions increased by 157.7 tonnes per dairy farm year between 2010 and 2017. In 2010 there were 15,654 dairy farms, in 2020 there were 15,319 dairy farms. Thus, their total emissions increased by 2.4 millon tonnes CO2 per year, a 4% increase on nations emissions.
Over 90% of milk products are is exported, most to the UK and other EU countries, but also increasingly to China and Africa (encurring futher CO2 emissions from transport). Cheap EU milk is putting African farmers out of business.
https://www.thejournal.ie/creamed-off-dairy-exports-6461193-Aug2024/
Additionally, the expansion of the dairy sector incresed agricultural pollution, with nitrates in rivers increasing year on year. See:
“Rivers and lakes face pollution crisis caused by Ireland’s dairy industry”
Total CO2 eq. emissions from the dairy sector are about 100 times the emissions from data centre generators (Emissions from the dairy sector fell back slightly in the last few years).
The problem of data centres isn’t their CO2 emissions, it’s their disproportionate electricity use which indeed threatens grid stability.
Ref.:
Läpple, D., Carter, C.A. and Buckley, C., 2022. EU milk quota abolition, dairy expansion, and greenhouse gas emissions. Agricultural Economics, 53(1), pp.125-142.
@David Jordan: and how much of the atmosphere is C02?
@David Jordan: you should look up the carbon cycle. And you might realise that the agricultural emissions don’t stack up, and It’s what the fuel industry wants you to believe because it makes them look good.
@Jim: 427.24 ppm, and the highest level in c. 16 million years. CO2 levels increased by 50% since 1900, 41% of this increase is due to the addition of 2.5 trillion tonnes of CO2 from fossil fuels and land use changes e.g. cutting down vast tracts of forest.
https://keelingcurve.ucsd.edu/
Friedlingstein, P., O’sullivan, M., Jones, M.W., Andrew, R.M., Hauck, J., Olsen, A., Peters, G.P., Peters, W., Pongratz, J., Sitch, S. and Le Quéré, C., 2020. Global carbon budget 2020. Earth System Science Data Discussions, 2020, pp.1-3.
The other question is why does such a relatively small amount of added gas have such a pronounced warming effect, with global temperature rising ten times faster than the end of the last ice age and reaching levels not seen in the last 130,000 years?
https://imgur.com/gallery/global-temperature-co2-levels-last-2000-years-5ioVzFY
Firstly the science behind the greenhouse effect in not new, it was first discovered by the French scientist and mathematician Joseph Fourier, who wrote in 1827,…
“As a dam built across a river causes a local deepening of the stream, so our atmosphere, thrown as a barrier across the terrestrial rays, produces a local heightening of the temperature at the Earth’s surface.”
The mistake you make is to think of CO2 as a once off deposit, but CO2 is an interest rate (global temperature is money in a bank account). Added CO2 and other greenhouse gasses accrue interest, adding a fraction of a penny to Earth’s temperature each day/night cycle, this build ups. There have been more than 45,625 days of accrued interest since 1900.
For example, if an ancestor of mine deposited £15 (analogous to 15 Celsius) in a bank account in 1900, with a tiny interest rate of only 0.04% per year (analogous to CO2 levels), the bank account would contain £15.77 by 2025, an increase of 5.1% (analogous to temperature increase).
This is how low levels of CO2 and other greenhouse gasses warm the planet (there is also an important amplifying effect of increased evaporation, from water vapour).
@David Jordan: that’s a great way of saying 0.004%
The information you are providing is pretty much meaningless & you are presenting the “warming effect” out of context.
It’s quite interesting the ‘studies’ you are quoting, their sources of funding & the counter studies which tell a different story but you wouldn’t know that because you are uding a GPT.
Funny how those desperate to ‘convince’ others of their argument try to baffle with reams of ‘information’ pulled from many sources.
The fact is, there is no “climate change” there is an environmental catastrophe created in the name of combating a scam.
It’s good to see that data centres won’t be subjected to any harmful caps on their fossil fuel usage. However, future data centres should also have the renewable energy requirement waved in order to make sure that they are maximising their output. I hope someday Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil give up on their renewable energy fantasy and stop forcing the rest of the economy to change over as well. Renewable energy simply isn’t working. The sun doesn’t always shine and the wind doesn’t always blow. Look at what happened to Germany. They relied on renewable energy so much that they had power shortages. Then they were forced to import coal from Poland and Russia, the worst pollutant of all and energy prices tripled. Despite being subsidised for 25 years, renewables only make up 14% of our energy.
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