Increasingly, we are finding that it is impossible to talk about ICTs, without also talking about electricity. Interesting new development on that front is reported by NYT.
EBay plans to use about six million watts of power generated on-site by fuel cells, which are a substantially cleaner and more efficient source of energy than coal, in its new data center in South Jordan, Utah. The company also operates PayPal, the online payment service, out of the South Jordan site. Bloom Energy, a private company in Sunnyvale, Calif., will make the fuel cells.
The new center will double the size of an existing data center there, which will still be on the grid. The grid will serve mainly as a backup power source for the new center. Even so, the fuel cells will account for less than 15 percent of the energy needs of all eBay data centers around the country — a clue that the industry is likely to remain deeply dependent on the grid and its energy mix indefinitely.
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