AI boom thrusts Europe between power-hungry data centers, environmental goals

Race for efficiency

Nebius, which has around $2 billion in cash on its balance sheet after splitting from Russia’s Yandex, has said it will be one of the first to bring Nvidia’s Blackwell platform to customers in 2025. The firm has also announced plans to invest more than $1 billion on AI infrastructure in Europe by the middle of next year.

Nebius’ Korolenko said liquid cooling is a “first step,” where cost of ownership will initially be worse before improving over time.

“There’s a big push to deliver, but at the same time, when you go to scale, you will want to have the ability to choose, to be economical and not sacrifice too much. Power efficiency is important for the running costs. It’s always a high priority,” Korolenko said.

Even before a boom in demand for AI applications hit the market, the data center industry in Europe was struggling to keep pace with the growing digital sector.

Sicco Boomsma, managing director of ING’s TMT team, said those involved in the market are “very sensitive to power” and that while Europe’s focus is on infrastructure, the U.S. has focused more on expanding assets in Europe where power is available.

“There’s a tremendous amount of data center operators also coming from the U.S. that are aligning in order to ensure that their data center infrastructure is in line with the various goals that the EU has as well, such as being carbon neutral, such as being efficient, on water utilization, maintaining biodiversity.”

“It is a sort of a race where they want to demonstrate that their knowledge is leading to super efficient infrastructure,” he said.

Source link : https://www.cnbc.com/2024/10/29/ai-boom-thrusts-europe-between-power-hungry-data-centers-environmental-goals.html

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Publish date : 2024-10-29 06:12:00

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