Sep 232012
 

According to the study referenced in the NYT article, only 6 to 12 percent of data center energy is going to computations – the rest is spent idling in anticipation of making fast responses to brief surges in user data requests. Nationally data centers consume about two percent of energy produced here, so the reported level of wastage means the equivalent of many small cities’ worth of annual power needs are lost in the shuffle.

Google reportedly uses 300 million watts annually, and Facebook 60 million watts. Wasted or not, that’s a lot of energy.

 Posted by at 4:13 pm on September 23, 2012