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28 Comments
- michaelpinto, on 01/21/2009, -1/+13I bet that we'll see more data centers start to get into solar sooner than later - even if it cuts a few of your costs that's more profit in the long term.
- poisenloaf, on 01/21/2009, -2/+11lol 10kilowatts will barely power a rack or two full of equipment much less a data center.
- MorganMghee, on 01/21/2009, -0/+8Better get started now then..
- HamstaMan, on 01/21/2009, -0/+7Unless they store up the power in batteries before feeding it to the data center. Relying on power coming directly from the solar panels would be pretty inefficient.
- suttin, on 01/21/2009, -0/+5And who says they have to be off the grid if they have solar panels?
- drmangrum, on 01/21/2009, -0/+4With such a small amount of energy generated, this seems more like a PR stunt. I would think the same money invested into solar-thermal would yield more power.
- Digger1123, on 01/21/2009, -1/+5Wow. I am surprised that the users of Digg finally came to the realization that we can't just convert to renewable energy overnight, or in decades for that matter.
- clockdist, on 01/21/2009, -0/+4Gotta start somewhere.
- Kerrigore, on 01/21/2009, -0/+3They should use it to predict solar flares.
- zeptobyte, on 01/21/2009, -0/+3I somehow read this as Super Powered, and am now appropriately disappointed.
- yisforyeti, on 01/21/2009, -0/+2FTA: "[The system] will offset an estimated 907,000 pounds of carbon dioxide...by 2025... That is equivalent to as much carbon dioxide produced by 919,005 miles driven in an average car."
Really? The average car traveled about 21k miles a year...twelve years ago: http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/rtecs/chapter3.html
Even with this outdated figure, the numbers above only equate to about 43 cars being taken off the road. So even if the quote is talking about emissions for a single year instead of the total from now until 2025 (I found the wording a little ambiguous), that's not very impressive. And it becomes still less so when you take into account poisenloaf's comment above.
Still, it sounds like this could be a good proof-of-concept on the road to larger systems. Too bad it can't happen more quickly. - Makz, on 01/21/2009, -0/+2this is the first step, the Matrix anyone ?
- bvinson, on 01/21/2009, -1/+3It is an additional complication. Most Datacenters already have several power inputs and battery arrays. Adding another one would not be difficult it would just be another service that would have to be managed.
- bvinson, on 01/21/2009, -0/+2I don't care about tests. I have a Server rack that runs completely on hamster power as a test, and I haven't told a anyone.
- hamobu, on 01/21/2009, -0/+2Energy just kind of radiates from the sun onto the earth surface. We really need more solar panels. I would like to have some on my home when I save up some money.
- tstocker, on 01/21/2009, -0/+2Great... I only need an additional 1,209,990 kilowatts to power my DeLorean...
- Fuggs, on 01/21/2009, -0/+210 kilowatts is not much, true. But if you happen to possess reading comprehension skills, you'll find that the article stated this current test is exactly that... a TEST. The goal here is not to run an actual data center with pure solar-generated electricity, but to begin gathering data for future, greener systems. I happen to work at the site where this test is being conducted, and no, it is not a PR stunt.
- inactive, on 01/21/2009, -0/+2FTA: "[The system] will offset an estimated 907,000 pounds of carbon dioxide...by 2025... That is equivalent to as much carbon dioxide produced by 919,005 miles driven in an average car."
That's about one pound of carbon per mile. If a car get 20 miles per gallon then how can a couple of ounces of gas produce a pound of carbon? - inactive, on 01/21/2009, -0/+2Just 10 KW of solar power for a data center? A single home clothes dryer uses 13 KW. Some people might say "It's a start" but I would say it's not a serious start. Just PR.
- bvinson, on 01/21/2009, -0/+210KW is hardly a data center. The data center that I run is 150 server and is considered small. and uses 40KW. Still we are moving in the right direction. It would be nice is Colocations officer a Solar power option.
- mrsteve007, on 01/21/2009, -0/+2As taken from my slashdot post on this subject:
http://geekpi.com/?p=142
I designed, installed and maintain a 10kw solar array last year to power our businesses servers and offer a large (2900 amp hour) uninterruptable power supply during prolonged grid outages.
We recapture the servers' waste heat during the winter to heat our facility at night. This cuts our heating bill dramatically. During the summer we vent that heat directly to the outside, and only use the AC as auxiliary cooling. It works excellently.
http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=sb_success.s ... - mksasaki, on 01/21/2009, -0/+1Man, Intel is into trying everything out. I wonder what Intel will be known for in 30 years. Kind of how Japan Tobacco company is a pharmaceutical company (despite the name).
- IamNomad, on 01/22/2009, -0/+1you've obviously never ran 20 servers in a room before.. It gets toasty real quick.
- kellyut, on 01/21/2009, -0/+1Good for Intel. It's a start. Though I have to wonder if a lot of these companies are jumping on the green bandwagon for publicity and/or public money purposes.
- dacheetah, on 01/22/2009, -0/+113kW?
My clothes dryer uses less then 2.4kW, and it's not considered efficient...
A modern CPU uses about 100W, and a normal server shouldn't use more than ½kW.
That's enough for a 20 server data centre, if you ignore things like air-con, which is often only needed for big data centres.
Also Solar will likely spit out 24v DC, which is pretty much what a PC takes, so the lack of converting should also make it more efficient... - inactive, on 01/21/2009, -0/+1These seem like fun ideas, but not very business savvy. Solar panels are too expensive to be useful. They will be like 100 years old before they pay for themselves, and I'm guessing they will break well before 100 years.
- dacheetah, on 01/22/2009, -0/+1Not really, they burnt the sky so that the solar robots would fail, but they found a better power source, fusion plus human body heat...
- revslowmo, on 01/21/2009, -5/+5During a cloudy day the data center is turned off.
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