As organizations of all kinds embraced the cloud and hybrid work, the environmental impact of massively expanding the world’s data center footprint wasn’t a primary concern. Data centers are one of the most energy-intensive building types, consuming as much as 50 times more energy per floor space than a typical commercial building, according to the US Department of Energy. Data centers consume 2% of all electricity in the US, according to the DoE.
“Data centers produce more Co2 than the airline industry,” said Ian Clatworthy, director of data platform solution marketing at Hitachi Vantara in this webinar. “It’s been our industry’s dirty little secret.”
The problem is complex. Data that’s stored but not used – “dark data” – is certainly an energy drain. In one study, 75% of IT decision makers said their organizations stored every piece of data, just in case. Now consider the coming data explosion of Generative AI in the enterprise. Legacy applications are another factor. Aging compute, storage, and network infrastructure consumes more power, cooling, and space resources than modern data infrastructure.
Some businesses include sustainability criteria in their data infrastructure RFPs, but the vast majority don't know where to start. In fact, 40% of IT technology leaders recently surveyed said they lacked any kind of sustainability or implementation plan.
“Sustainability is not a core competency of most businesses,” said Kimberly King, Senior Vice President, Strategic Partners & Alliances, Hitachi Vantara in her blog. “Most need help, they need expertise, ideas; they’re looking for collaboration and direction.”
Jumpstart with Sustainability with Trusted Partners
“We believe the first steps an enterprise can take in their sustainability journey are in the data center – and we have the support to help them get it done,” continues King. “Increasingly, sustainability is a balancing act of performance and planet that can lead to greater strength and agility for both.”
Hitachi Vantara’s commitment starts with a vision for a more sustainable future. The company plans to achieve carbon neutrality in its offices and factories by fiscal 2030 and throughout its value chain by 2050. Hitachi Vantara is the only storage vendor certified by Carbon Footprint for Products. Enhanced data reduction technology allows more user data to be stored on the purchased capacity. Patented technology helps reduce power consumption by 30-40 percent, depending on the model, without compromising performance. Hitachi Vantara is even using recycled plastic materials from water bottles and DVDs for the front bezel of an upcoming storage system.
Hitachi Vantara is also committed to helping its distribution and channel partners on their own sustainability journeys.
Partners can leverage Hitachi Sustainability Services for a holistic approach to identifying opportunities to improve energy efficiency across applications, IT assets, and energy supply for both customers and their own businesses.
Hitachi Vantara and Cisco have partnered to help businesses get started with decarbonizing the data center. IT teams can get better visibility – and management control over – infrastructure energy consumption by leveraging both Hitachi Vantara Ops Center Clear Sight and Cisco’s Unified Platform Experience.
Hitachi Vantara and VMware have teamed up to allow IT teams to manage converged or hyperconverged infrastructure stacks across a unified software-defined plane, so any app can run in any location, via any cloud, and be delivered to any user. Virtualization maximizes data center resource utilization, increasing efficiency and enabling capacity to be delivered where it’s needed.
Hitachi Vantara and Equinix partnered to enable customers to locate the environmentally friendly Hitachi Vantara VSP storage platform quickly and easily at Equinix data centers around the world. With Hitachi Cloud Connect for Equinix, customers can deploy VSP systems in the cloud with the same management, monitoring, and predictive analytics as on-prem, but with simplified control over a hybrid cloud environment.
“The transition to sustainable businesses will be historic for all involved, enterprises, partners and tech providers,” said King. “And while every company may not have the expertise to embark on their sustainable future, there are people who do. No one can go it alone in this green, new world.”
There’s no shortcut to sustainability. But you can get started by seeing how much energy your storage systems are consuming in this handy online calculator.
Image Credit: Hitachi Vantara