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Data centre water usage in the spotlight as Thames Water prepares hosepipe ban

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Data centre water usage in the spotlight as Thames Water prepares hosepipe ban

Data centres around London are major consumers of water and electricity

Thames Water is reviewing the use of drinking water by data centres in and around London on the eve of introducing a hosepipe ban.

According to the FT, an investigation into data centre consumption was launched by strategic development manager John Hernon, who told the paper the company was looking at ways that untreated water could be used to cool the facilities instead of potable supplies.

As a result of the drought, the company will introduce a hosepipe ban for its 15 million customers from tomorrow, covering large areas of Oxfordshire, Gloucestershire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Surrey, as well as parts of Wiltshire and Kent and the Greater London area.

"From Wednesday 24 August, we're bringing in a hosepipe ban (also known as a Temporary Use Ban) for all customers we supply water to, even if we don't bill you directly," Thames Water says on its website.

The London area, and particularly the M4 corridor, is home to a rapidly growing number of data centres, which compete for resources with homes, businesses, agriculture and wildlife.

Water is not the only crunch point. Last month property developers in three West London boroughs were told the electricity grid in the area was full to capacity, in part because of the amount of power drawn by data centres, and that applications for connecting new builds could be delayed by up to 10 years.

See also: Making data centres more sustainable

Water-cooled data centres using techniques like evaporative cooling are more energy-efficient than air-conditioned facilities, but heavier on water usage: large data centres can use tens of litres of water per second. A 2016 study by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory found the average data centre water use in the United States to was 1.8 litres of water per kWh of total data centre site energy use. The EU plans to introduce targets to limit water usage by data centres to 0.4 l/kWh.

Waterless data centre cooling technologies are becoming available, but for now water remains the most common coolant.

Thames Water recently rejected an application for a new data centre in Slough on water use grounds, insisting the developer provide more water storage facilities on site, according to the FT article.

The water company has been roundly criticised for being slow to fix its leaky pipes, imposing bans while continuing to dish out shareholder dividends and management bonuses and pumping sewage into waterways. According to Thames Water's own figures, 635 million litres of water are lost to leakages per day - almost a quarter of its total supply.

Data centre water usage in the spotlight as Thames Water prepares hosepipe ban

Data centres around London are major consumers of water and electricity

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