New Delhi: The government is planning to develop a large data centre hub in the city of Visakhapatnam in the state of Andhra Pradesh, which has sparked concerns about water consumption in the region, particularly because water resources are already a limited resource in the city. The IT Minister Nara Lokesh says that future data centres would not be drawing water from the city’s drinking water resources.
The projects will not get water that is intended for housing but instead they will use water from the separate industrial allocations and treated water. Lokesh also stated that newer cooling technologies may help in cutting down the water usage in data centres. The proposed data centre ecosystem could potentially grow to 6.5 GW of capacity over the years, and may consume around 3 TMC of water annually, based on current technology, reports a recent report.
It is thought that the government’s guarantee will not completely address the obstacles for these projects. A large amount of electricity and cooling is required to run thousands of servers safely within the data centre. In the past, there were some cooling systems that consume a lot of water. The total requirement for water by the data centres can also escalate with the increase in the number and size of data centres. This may be a worry in a town already facing water scarcity issues.
Reuters reported earlier this month that Visakhapatnam is supplied with 410 million litres of water daily, while its demand is estimated to be 480 million litres per day. Some areas of the city also suffer from water rationing. In this regard, environmentalists and local residents have raised doubts over the possibility of giving long-term water assurances to big industrial projects, while the city itself is suffering from water scarcity.
There are other issues besides drinking water concerns. The proposed locations of the data centres projects, and the potential effect on surrounding natural habitats, have caused concerns among environmental groups. Another issue in the discussion is the Kambalakonda Wildlife Sanctuary, for which legal proceedings have already been taken on environmental issues.
The paramount issue for the data centre sector then might be demonstrating how effective the government’s water policy is in real life. It will require independent water supplies, a robust wastewater management system and effective cooling systems. Systematic monitoring is also crucial to assure safe supply of drinking water in the future.
The government’s policy decision by itself does not imply that data centres can’t be established in Visakhapatnam. Rather, it will place more emphasis on compliance of water saving obligations by authorities and companies.
If these measures prove to be successful, then Visakhapatnam can be able to draw larger investments from the Technology field without exerting additional pressure to the locals. However, in the case of a higher demand on water than initially anticipated, this might develop into a significant problem for future data centre growth.
The question of whether or not data centres will consume drinking water is not the only one that needs to be considered now, however: does the city have sufficient sustainable water resources to sustain its rapidly developing digital industry and population growth?
