GreenSquareDC, a data centre company based in WA, has announced that Multiplex will be responsible for constructing its WAi1 facility. The data centre aims to achieve net zero carbon emissions and is targeting a Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) of 1.1, well below the industry average of 2.5.
To uphold its green claims, GreenSquareDC plans to use renewable diesel instead of fossil fuel diesel for backup generation and utilize certified 100 percent green power. The facility will also feature an onsite microgrid for resilience and redundancy. GreenSquareDC intends to employ a groundwater cooling loop, similar to CSIRO’s Pawsey Centre supercomputer, to eliminate wastewater, reducing both cost and emissions compared to traditional cooling towers. For future phases of WAi1, the company is considering incorporating green hydrogen and/or fuel cells.
Located in Belmont, between Perth CBD and the airport, WAi1 will consist of two 48MW buildings, expandable to 150MW. Additionally, GreenSquareDC plans to establish a 200MW wind and solar farm at East Hyden. The data centre aims to cater to customers seeking environmentally sustainable solutions for their AI and HPC workloads while achieving cost savings due to its low power consumption. According to the company, benchmarking indicates that its facility will be approximately $55 million cheaper to operate annually compared to a typical Sydney data centre.
The CEO of GreenSquareDC, Walt Coulston, expressed the company’s commitment to providing highly sustainable, affordable, and scalable data centre solutions to hyperscale, government, and wholesale customers with shared goals of combating climate change. Together with Multiplex, GreenSquareDC aims to construct the project using low carbon concrete and other sustainable materials, significantly reducing embodied carbon and contributing to CO2 removal from the environment.
The project aligns with the federal government’s mandate for companies to report their Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions from 2024, further highlighting the significance of environmentally conscious initiatives in the data centre industry.