Malaysia's government is showing it's serious about the country's goals for carbon neutrality by 2050.
That commitment extends to the regulations centered around Google's first-ever data center in the country, as Digital Infra Network reported.
Malaysia's Minister of Investment, Trade, and Industry, Tengku Zafrul Aziz, announced the data center will be subject to guidelines regulating power and water usage efficiency.
Malaysian tech experts SoyaCincau.com shed more light on one way in which the project will live up to its end of the bargain. The data center will use water-cooling technology that will require 10% less energy than comparable air-cooling systems while producing 10% less carbon pollution.
Zafrul Aziz also said an upcoming Malaysian government project, Corporate Renewable Energy Support Scheme, will connect companies with clean energy providers.
That could allow Google to replicate what they've done elsewhere. In Arizona, they are powering a data center with batteries harnessing renewable energy and eschewing the use of dirty energy.
Demand for data centers is skyrocketing with the rise of AI. Goldman Sachs projects a 160% increase in demand for them by 2030. In response, companies are scrambling for different ways to power energy-guzzling data centers. Microsoft is even reopening a section of the Three Mile Island nuclear energy plant.
Researchers, governments, and companies are working across a series of different paths to address the sky-high required energy use of these data centers. Finding more efficient ways to cool the technological devices is one way. Making AI computation less wasteful is another.
Malaysia's guidelines and regulations are a proactive measure to control the increasing demands for energy.
If replicated worldwide, it should incentivize Google and other companies to find ways to get more efficient in powering the increasing strain on their data centers. That can spur innovation when it comes to optimizing demanding processes like AI.
"We recognize the energy-intensive nature of data centers, which is why our Green Investment Strategy is focused on ensuring that new digital infrastructure projects … contribute to our goal of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050," Zafrul Aziz said at an unveiling of the project.
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