The energy use of data centers is a topic that has received much attention, given that data centers currently account for 1-2% of global electricity use. Cloud computing holds great potential to reduce data center energy demand moving due to both large reductions in total servers through consolidation and large increases in facility efficiencies compared to traditional onsite data centers. However, analyzing the net energy implications of shifts to the cloud can be very difficult, because data center services can affect many different components of society’s economic and energy systems. This report summarizes research by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Northwestern University to address this challenge for net energy use analysis.
We developed a comprehensive yet user-friendly, open-access model for assessing the net energy and emissions implications of cloud services in different regions and at different levels of market adoption. The model—named the Cloud Energy and Emissions Research (CLEER) Model—provided calculations and input value assumptions so that its data and methods could be easily improved by the global research community. We applied the CLEER Model to assess the technical potential of cloud-based business software for reducing energy use and greenhouse gas emissions in the United States. We focused on three common business applications—email, productivity software and customer relationship management (CRM) software—all used by tens of millions of U.S. workers. This report captures those findings based upon data available in the early 2010s. The public version of the CLEER model has now been closed, however, given the age of the underlying data. Please see resources arising from more current LBNL projects (e.g., our IT Efficiency Tool) regarding energy use and emissions associated with data centers and digital services.
Author(s): Masanet, E., Shehabi, A., Ramakrishnan, L., Liang, J., Ma, X., Walker, B., Hendrix, V., and P. Mantha