The European Commission has awarded 27 data centres of technology giant IBM for energy efficiency, based on the European Union (EU) Code of Conduct for Data Centres.
The honour represents the largest portfolio of data centres from a single company to receive the recognition, IBM said.
Increasing energy consumption led to the creation of the EU Code of Conduct. The EU aims to inform and encourage data centre operators on reducing energy consumption in an cost-effective manner that doesn’t negatively impact mission-critical data centre functions. The assessment is made against a set of best practices to reduce energy losses, which include the usage of energy-efficient hardware, installing free cooling and cold aisle containment, IBM added.
The 27 IBM data centres the European Commission has awarded represent more than 70pc of the company’s strategic outsourcing data centres in 15 European countries.
The energy improvements implemented in these data centres helped IBM meet a goal set in 2007 to double the IT capacity of its data centres within three years without increasing the power consumption.
“Data centres have always been a critical part of IBM’s heritage and are a significant part of our energy use and costs,” said Harry van Dorenmalen, IBM chairman, Europe.
“The recognition of our commitment and leadership by the EU Code of Conduct is important to us since energy and climate-related issues are part of IBM’s long-standing corporate commitment to environmental leadership. Based on our Smarter Planet vision, we can substantially reduce energy consumption in many ways in our society.”
