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Equinix and National University of Singapore Partner to Explore Sustainability and Energy Solutions for Data Centers

Nov 27, 2024

The Co-Innovation Facility will incubate liquid cooling, cognitive digital twin and other innovations for digital infrastructure that supports sustainability in tropical locations

HONG KONG – November 28, 2024 Equinix, Inc. (Nasdaq: EQIX), the world’s digital infrastructure company®, and the Centre for Energy Research & Technology (CERT) under the National University of Singapore’s College of Design and Engineering (NUS CDE) today announced its plan to set up a Co-Innovation Facility (CIF) in Singapore to accelerate the testing and development of innovative solutions focused on low-carbon energy, high-efficiency cooling, circularity, and energy efficiency optimization for data centers. Accelerating these innovations will shape the future of digital infrastructure and services in Singapore and other tropical locations, as well as address sustainability goals.

Singapore’s digital economy has grown at a compound annual growth rate of close to 13% since 2017, contributing 17.3% to its gross domestic product (GDP) in 20221. Furthermore, according to the recent 2024 National Budget, Singapore is strengthening its position as a global business and innovation hub by investing more than $740 million into Artificial Intelligence (AI) over the next five years2. As digital demands accelerate, data centers have become the foundation of today’s digital economy. To support digital growth more sustainably, data centers need to explore new ways to reduce energy consumption and implement energy efficiency solutions to cope with increased workloads and processing requirements.

To be built inside Equinix’s upcoming SG6 International Business Exchange™ (IBX®) data center, the CIF aligns with Equinix’s Data Center of the Future Initiative toward building cleaner, more efficient data centers around the world. This CIF will be an open research hub for leading global technology innovators, data center technology partners, academia, and customers to co-develop and trial core and edge technologies that deliver reliability, energy efficiency, and cost efficiency.

With an initial investment of US$4 million from Equinix, the CIF will serve as an incubator to trial innovations such as enabling the integration of clean and renewable energy sources and alternative power generation, with the aim of assessing their ability to operate at scale. Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) will also be utilized by the facility along with other advancements, such as liquid cooling, which is becoming more vital as AI makes data processing more compute intensive. The facility will also trial Cognitive Digital Twin (CDT) capabilities of predictive maintenance and upgrades to address challenges faced by current data center models.

Yee May Leong, Managing Director, Singapore, Equinix, said: “The effects of climate change are being felt around the world, and it is becoming increasingly urgent to embed best practices in every aspect of our operations. By replicating our successful Co-Innovation Facility from Ashburn and expanding our collaborative efforts in the Asia-Pacific region, we are reaching a significant milestone in advancing our "Future First" sustainability agenda. It will accelerate the development of cutting-edge technologies and apply real-world solutions to help reduce the carbon footprint of the growing number of data centers worldwide.”  

Professor Lee Poh Seng, Director, Centre for Energy Research & Technology, NUS College of Design and Engineering, said, “The establishment of the Co-Innovation Facility highlights our commitment to forging impactful industry partnerships that translate groundbreaking research into practical applications. Collaborating with Equinix enables us to leverage our expertise in energy innovation and sustainability to address critical challenges faced by data centers in tropical climates. Together, we aim to redefine benchmarks for operational efficiency and sustainability in digital infrastructure, aligning with Singapore's ambitions for sustainable development and technological leadership. This partnership is a powerful step forward in shaping a future where cutting-edge innovation meets environmental responsibility.”

Key Highlights:

  • To be opened in Q1 2027, the CIF will trial sustainable innovations for data centers, such as:
    • Alternative power solutions: Alternative power generation solutions such as fuel cells and battery storage, can provide low-carbon power solutions for data centers, serving as bi-directional grid interfaces and on-site prime and/or backup solutions.
    • Direct current power distribution system: An electrical power distribution architecture known as medium voltage AC to low-voltage DC (MVAC-LVDC),  facilitates the seamless integration of battery energy storage system (BESS), solar photovoltaics (PV) and other renewable energy sources (RES) coupled to the data center power distribution network, with the potential to enhance grid-side power quality, efficiency, and power density for data centers.
    • Liquid cooling: This advanced cooling method reduces energy consumption and noise while optimizing space. It also increases the potential for waste heat reuse, supporting circular data center models.
    • Digital twin capabilities: Data-driven model and machine learning will be utilized to enable predictive maintenance and upgrades.
  • Equinix and NUS have long supported Singapore’s sustainability agenda and implemented various initiatives to support the growth of sustainable development in the country, including scholarship opportunities in nature-based climate solutions for students at NUS.
  • In 2022, Equinix together with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and CERT, both under NUS CDE, collaborated to explore hydrogen-based green fuel technologies for mission-critical data center infrastructure. The study compared PEM fuel cells and fuel-flexible linear generators, highlighting their efficiency and potential as backup power solutions, particularly in tropical climates. The results were released in 2023.
  • Equinix operates 268 data centers across 73 metros, providing digital infrastructure for more than 10,000 of the world’s leading businesses. Since 2021, Equinix has been driving toward an approved near-term science-based target (SBT) for emissions reduction by 2030.

Additional Resources

About Equinix

Equinix (Nasdaq: EQIX) is the world’s digital infrastructure company®. Digital leaders harness Equinix’s trusted platform to bring together and interconnect foundational infrastructure at software speed. Equinix enables organizations to access all the right places, partners and possibilities to scale with agility, speed the launch of digital services, deliver world-class experiences and multiply their value, while supporting their sustainability goals.

Forward Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially from expectations discussed in such forward-looking statements. Factors that might cause such differences include, but are not limited to, risks to our business and operating results related to the COVID-19 pandemic; the current inflationary environment; foreign currency exchange rate fluctuations; increased costs to procure power and the general volatility in the global energy market; the challenges of acquiring, operating and constructing IBX and xScale® data centers and developing, deploying and delivering Equinix products and solutions; unanticipated costs or difficulties relating to the integration of companies we have acquired or will acquire into Equinix; a failure to receive significant revenues from customers in recently built out or acquired data centers; failure to complete any financing arrangements contemplated from time to time; competition from existing and new competitors; the ability to generate sufficient cash flow or otherwise obtain funds to repay new or outstanding indebtedness; the loss or decline in business from our key customers; risks related to our taxation as a REIT and other risks described from time to time in Equinix filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. In particular, see recent and upcoming Equinix quarterly and annual reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, copies of which are available upon request from Equinix. Equinix does not assume any obligation to update the forward-looking information contained in this press release.

Media Contact (Asia-Pacific) 
Equinix
Annie Ho 
annho@ap.equinix.com

Equinix Media Contact (Hong Kong) 
Ivan Leung
ivan.leung@teamlewis.com