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Microsoft datacentres did not consume excess water during summer heatwave

Microsoft datacentres did not consume excess water during summer heatwave, the company asserts

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Microsoft datacentres did not consume excess water during summer heatwave, the company asserts

Exceptionally high temperatures in Europe would not lead to increased water usage in the future, Microsoft believes

Despite the summer heat wave, Microsoft datacentres didn't use any more water than normal, according to the software giant.

The company rejected the findings of reports which claimed that one of Microsoft's massive datacentre facilities in Europe used scandalously large amounts of water at a time when temperatures throughout the continent reached record highs.

Earlier this year, Dutch newspapers accused Microsoft of consuming four times more water in 2021 as it had told officials when requesting approval to keep expanding a large datacentre facility at the Agriport business park in Hollands Kroon.

The software firm noted in a statement to Computer Weekly that its datacentres at the Agriport business park did not consume any more water in this heatwave year than usual. It added that the exceptionally high temperatures in Europe would not lead to increased water usage in the future.

Microsoft has reported varying statistics for its water consumption in Agriport, sparking a heated political debate which has resulted in the Dutch government preventing at least three competing companies from expanding and building hyperscale datacentres there and elsewhere in the Netherlands on the grounds that the environmental damage and quality of life issues caused to local residents in these areas outweighs the economic benefits of such infrastructure.

According to Microsoft's statements, between 10,000 cubic metres and 100,000 cubic metres water was used by its data centres last year - quite the variation. The firm says the extra water utilised last year was not used to operate datacentres but rather to build more of them.

Local government officials and utility companies have also claimed that the water usage of Microsoft's Agriport datacentres is modest.

According to Microsoft, datacentres with air-cooling systems only employ water when the outside temperature is so high that the air is not cold enough to do the job on its own. Such high temperatures are only reached for a brief period of time at the height of summer in cold, northerly countries such as the Netherlands.

Microsoft increased the datacentres' operational temperatures last year, taking them over the conventional limits that makers consider the safe maximum temperature for computers. This changed the temperature threshold at which its datacentres may utilise outside air for cooling without also using water from 27°C to 29.4°C.

More recently, Microsoft has partnered with ECW Energy on a project to store rainwater from the rooftops of its Agriport buildings underground and utilise it when it needs water in the summer.

According to a statement made to Dutch water industry newspaper Waterforum last year, the software giant also intends to begin employing a waterless liquid-cooling technology extensively within two years.

In 2020, Microsoft tested an undersea data centre near the Orkney Islands in the North Sea as part of an experiment to use natural resources as passive cooling solutions. Scientists have warned that, as global temperatures increase, intense heatwaves are likely to occur more often, so tech firms are scrambling to discover greener alternatives that use less energy and produce less heat.

'Our objective moving forward is to continue providing transparency across the entire datacentre lifecycle about how we infuse principles of reliability, sustainability, and innovation at each step of the datacentre design, construction, and operations process,' Microsoft said.

'We have started by sharing datacentre region-specific data around carbon, water, waste, ecosystems, and community development and we will continue to provide updates as Microsoft makes further investments globally.'

Microsoft datacentres did not consume excess water during summer heatwave

Exceptionally high temperatures in Europe would not lead to increased water usage in the future, Microsoft believes

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