Andrea Alms Video:  Money In Motion 23 - The Energy Hungry Data Storage Market

TRANSCRIPT:

Hello. My name is Andrea Alms. I'm technology investor and financial manager and this is your money in motion. I was asked about data storage and research revealed that this is an energy hungry market and a greenhouse contributor. Think about it at the bottom of emails it says Please consider the environment before printing. But for those who care about global warming, you might want to consider not writing so many emails in the first place. The problem is that all those messages require energy to preserve and despite the technology focus on renewables, the advent of streaming and artificial intelligence is only accelerating the amount of fossil fuels burned to keep data servers up, running and cool. Another recent analogy is that 30 minutes of video streaming online is about 1.7 kilograms of carbon dioxide emissions. The same amount of carbon dioxide emissions as driving nearly four miles. This claim is backed up by the estimate that next flick streaming data centers utilize roughly 370 terawatts per year. Data centers consume about 2% of the world's electricity, and that's expected to reach 8% by 2030. Moreover, only about 6% of all data ever created is used, according to research from Hewlett Packard Enterprise. That means 94% is sitting in a vast virtual and Internet landfill having a massive carbon footprint. Its cost is the equivalent of maintaining the airline industry of data we don't even use. That's a quote by Andrew Chow, a senior researcher, analysis analyst at Perseus Investments. Think about all those decade old emails sitting on servers around the world. So far, the tech industry's response has been to buy more renewable energy. According to Bloomberg, the global data center storage market is witness to grow by 2107 billion U.S. dollars and a top out average growth rate of 28% from 2019 to 2023. Yes, we like multibillion dollar markets and double digit growth. This data storage market has an energy appetite growing from 2% to about 8% over the next eight years. On the next episode, let's check out the major data storage market players and how they're becoming the biggest procurers and buyers of energy. Who knew that the cloud business would equate the energy business? Thank you. This is your money. Your money in motion.