The world's data centers are expected to consume 19% more energy in the next 12 months than they have in the past year, according to results of a global industry census conducted by DatacenterDynamics.

Data centers currently consume about 31GW, a report on energy consumption data included in the census concludes. The average total power to rack is about 4.05kW, with 58% of racks consuming 5kW per rack, 28% consuming from 5kW to 10kW per rack and the rest consuming more than 10kW per rack.

Download our report on global data center energy consumption here

"The greatest increase in power demand is in market samples with greatest projected facility growth over the next 12 months," the report reads. Therefore, bigger increases in energy use are expected in major European and US markets than anywhere else.

"In these markets a high adoption of efficiency strategies, IT architecture and per-rack consumption that are already the highest in the world indicate a market situation where increased IT capacity can be achieved with minimum of increase in the energy requirement."

Worldwide data center power consumption growth ranking:

Because energy demand is expected to rise so much, data center owners and operators are concerned about energy cost and availability. Analysis of the census data concluded that energy cost and availability were the number-one concern for a big portion of them.

More than 40% of participants believe increasing energy costs will have a strong impact on their data center operations in the next 12 months.