FOCUS LONDON
Issue 18, October/November
the end result for the CRC. “There was poor communication, it was complex, and on one side it was meant to be very simple while on the fl ipside it was quite a complex journey for companies trying to achieve what the CRC initially required,” Bowman says.
“In the initial scheme, there were benefi ts for those putting energy effi ciency measures in place (such as a League Table which praised those investing in effi ciency).”
REDUCTIONS CONTRIBUTE TO GROWTH
Against this backdrop, London data center operators have still been grappling for space. Market analysts and operators alike have no trouble citing the London region, and surrounds, as being in demand.
Telecity’s Oosthoek has been helping the company manage its growth plans for London.
“We are very much expanding our core locations,” Oosthoek says. “We are expanding our Telecity
Harbour Exchange (in one
of Europe’s most sought after data center locations, The Docklands, an extension of the fi nancial trading district of the City) and we opened up our Park Royal location in 2008 which is also doing very well. We are also expanding in Power Gate (central London).”
“The UK is a very buoyant market, with very very healthy demand. When we had the fi nancial crisis in 2008 to 2009 we effectively saw an increase in demand for our services. Outsourcing uptake grew because people saw
THE RENEWABLE CHALLENGE
Renewable energy is being pushed as the future for cities facing energy challenges around the world. District heating in Sweden, geothermal in Iceland, even biopower and solar power in Israel. But powering London with renewable? That is a whole new ballpark, according to Ark Continuity’s Ian Bitterlin.
Bitterlin says despite power stations heading towards closure in the UK, the country’s main cities would never be able to rely solely on renewable. “You can’t apply renewable inside a city — it is very much a decentralized grid- related exercise”.
In the UK, only 3.5% of the electricity grid is renewable. The largest proportion of this comes from hydroelectricity in Scotland. The UK Government in its Electricity Market Reform whitepaper released in September said it wants
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outsourcing as a more effi cient alternative to inhouse data centers. That trend has only grown in strength in the last few years.”
POWER PROBLEMS
Power is a very real modern-day concern in London, and many colocation and other providers will say rising power rates coupled with a poor economy have pushed up demand.
On one side it was meant to be very simple while on the flipside it was quite a complex journey for companies
The situation is not likely to ease in coming years. In September this year UK Energy Minister Chris Huhne summed up the challenge for the government saying: “We have a Herculean task ahead of us. The scale of investment needed in our electricity system in order to keep the lights on is more than twice the rate of the last decade. The fact is that the current electricity market is not able to meet that challenge. Without action, there is a risk of uncomfortably low capacity margins from around the end of the decade and a far higher chance of costly blackouts.”
Andrew Jones is the managing director of consultancy fi rm Alquist (Alquist has also created measuring and monitoring tools for the data center). His talk at DatacenterDynamics London last year gained widespread attention for its grim forecast on the UK’s energy future.
to increase this fi gure to 15% by 2015 as a quarter of the UK’s current generating capacity is lost. “A new generation of power sources including renewables, new nuclear, and carbon capture and storage, along with new gas plants to provide fl exibility and back-up capacity, will secure our electricity supply as well as bring new jobs and new expertise to the UK economy,” UK Energy Minister Chris Huhne says.
Despite this, Bitterlin says a number of data center operators in the UK are already pushing the fact they are using renewable energy. “It is just good PR, because at the end of the day people are still considering price before power. The biggest problem is that if a data center is using renewable energy, then it means that energy is no longer available to a less fortunate consumer, as there is only 3.5% to go around.”
See what Bitterlin’s ideal green data center is on Page 60 of this edition
Scottish hydropower makes up 3.5% of the green energy allocation in the UK
“Forcing industry to improve its energy effi ciency is essential to bridge the energy gap that is coming in 2015,” Jones warns. “Over £200bn of investment is required to upgrade the generation and distribution network. It’s diffi cult to see where this investment will come from given the tough economic climate.”
The UK relies on imports for some of its energy already, and gas reserves in the North Sea are running out, as is the life of numerous UK power stations. Jones, along with many others, believes energy pricess will rise in coming years. This is likely to drive more data center operators into the countryside. Power outside of London is cheaper, along with the rent.
Hurlypalmerfl att’s Bowman says he believes the issue goes beyond supply. Infrastructure at a sub-station level is also failing and in need of serious refurbishment. He says in many cases this is pushing data center operators to look into building new sites rather than retrofi tting old ones. And those that are retrofi tting are looking at using resources more effi ciently, rather than spending money on new kit or building out further.
When it comes to data center operators in London, a lot can, and does, change over the course of year. And in the case of the CRC, the ideas only take a few years to become old. But new challenges are just around the corner for this market. The CRC has been only been the fi rst taste of some much bigger issues about the challenge the data center market. n
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