The AI boom is driving a groundswell in data centre construction the likes of which haven’t been seen before. With construction pipelines valued in the hundreds of billions of dollars, the impact of this wave will be felt everywhere, but especially with regard to the industry’s sustainability goals and impact on national energy grids.
To learn more, we sat down this month with Mehdi Paryavi, the founder and CEO of the International Data centre Authority (IDCA). He’s an advisor on AI, data centres, cybersecurity, the cloud, IoT and digital infrastructure, and works closely with governments, presidents, prime ministers, the UN and Fortune 100 companies, providing advice on building a version of the industry that’s sustainable, secure, and scalable.
Interface: Hey Medhi. Could you start quickly by introducing yourself, your role, and the role the IDCA is playing within the larger industry to our readers?
Paryavi: I chair the International Data centre Authority. We are a digital economy think tank based out of Washington DC. We work with hyperscalers, AI companies, and governments alike.
Our aim is to help every nation on the planet, including the global economic and industrial zones, truly benefit from the digital era. We work in close collaboration with the UN to help assess the digital infrastructure gaps and how to deliver an all-inclusive ecosystem that simply makes everyone’s lives better… In short, we’re a non-partisan, global think tank that focuses and works with nations as well as industry stakeholders to create AI policies, Digital Hubs and Digital Economies through the standardisation of the approach, selection, design, feasibility, operation, and various processes and methodologies of digital infrastructure and related processes and systems.
Interface: How is the AI boom changing demand for data centre infrastructure? How does it compare to the race for cloud a few years ago? And what is it about AI that makes it so demanding in terms of water, power, and land?
Paryavi: The AI era cannot be compared with the cloud era. AI has taken the demand to just another level. The world has an approximate of ~55GW of data centre capacity and, mainly due to AI, we are projected to grow to 300GW by 2030, that is a 600% growth of what humanity has come up with to date, in just 5 years.
Interface: If AI could account for nearly half of ALL datacentre power consumption by the end of this year, what can we do to mitigate this?
Paryavi: Energy remains the bottleneck here as well as manpower (human capital). This is why we are working closely with the nations that can upskill and re-skill the human talent, have the energy and the supporting tech companies to identify synergistic means to tap into both energy, water, land and human resources. It has to come to global collaboration and consistency, there is no other way we can meet this level of demand in such a short time.
Interface: What is the current state of legislation and regulation around AI data centres’ environmental impact? Is what we’re doing adequate?
Paryavi: We are working very hard to create proper and practical legislation on the international basis – this is key. Everything needs regulation. The problem is that the legislator is not educated enough nor fast enough to wrap its head around the ever-evolving progression of data centres, AI nor the environment. Don’t forget the ethics behind AI, that’s an even greater concern that hardly anyone talks about.
Interface: How do things like the UK government’s clean power 2030 ambitions square with Kier Starmer’s creation of “AI zones” and pro-AI stance?
Paryavi: Sustainable growth is the key. A recent survey from a European data centre association shows that 94% of new power for data centres in recent years has been sustainable. We see the same trend in the US.
Interface: What does a “green AI data centre” look like? Is such a thing even possible?
Paryavi: Green is one of the world’s most abused terms. You really need to get technically deep and holistic to identify the core KPIs of the green anything, let alone green AI data centres. In general, sustainability is good for everybody, both for the environment and the financial books of the operators. It makes absolute sense to find more efficient ways to power and cool data centres, and this is another area where we are truly helping to push the envelope to innovation. But if you want a direct answer, we are not yet at the stage of having fully green data centres.
Interface: How are operators planning on closing the AI energy gap to power the next wave of demand?
Paryavi: Operators are trying everything to capture as much energy just to keep up with the demand. The top solutions right now are natural gas, hydro, and geothermal, of course the end game in our industry and such level of demand is SMRs (nuclear) – everyone is working towards that goal, at the moment.
Interface: How badly could we see things go if we don’t meet these challenges?
Paryavi: Like with any industry, things could go very good or very bad. This is why everyone needs guidance, countries, states, semiconductor companies, hyperscalers, colos, everyone needs to adhere to universal norms and guidelines and make sure that in meeting their client needs, they do not sacrifice the greater good.
Interface: Anything else you’d like to mention?
Paryavi: The only thing I would like to add is education, education, education… We are living in the world of assumptions. People talk about data centres but they have no idea what they are and what they do. They talk about AI but they don’t know what it really takes to receive true AI services. They ask for ‘green’ stuff, but they are not willing to pay for the transition. It’s a complex world out there and we are doing everything else to simplify it.
- Infrastructure & Cloud
- Sustainability Technology