Data centers are the backbone of our digital world as they serve as central hubs for storing, processing, and managing a massive amount of data.

They help ensure our high quality of life, such as enabling us to make quick and convenient online transactions, connecting us with our colleagues around the world via emails and video calls, allowing companies to store their infrastructures remotely via cloud computing, and more.

However, data centers consume a significant amount of energy, and a portion of that energy is used to power backup generators. Traditionally, these backup generators have run on fossil diesel, which is a major source of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

Reducing GHG emissions

For diesel-powered backup generators, renewable diesel, also known as hydrotreated vegetable oil or HVO100, has been used by several data center operators around the world as a solution to decarbonize backup generators. Renewable diesel is a significantly lower-emission power source, delivering up to 95 percent less GHG emissions over its lifecycle compared to fossil diesel.

Renewable diesel is a liquid fuel that works seamlessly with all diesel engines and energy infrastructure, including pipelines, storage tanks, and more. It is chemically similar to fossil diesel, while the key difference is the raw materials used to make the fuel.

Renewable fuels are produced with renewable raw materials, biomass, which contains carbon absorbed from the atmosphere during photosynthesis. The biomass used for producing renewable diesel often includes things like used cooking oil or animal fat waste.

Companies like Neste collect a wide variety of these raw materials, essentially recycling the carbon they contain. The collected raw materials undergo a refining process. A key step is called hydrotreating, where hydrogen is used to remove oxygen from the raw material to create hydrocarbons, the building blocks of fuels like renewable diesel.

Unlike fossil fuels that introduce new, additional carbon into the atmosphere when burned in diesel engines, renewable fuels recycle carbon that already existed in the atmosphere. This makes them a more sustainable option, a lower-emission alternative to fossil diesel.

Seamless transition while ensuring resiliency

Since renewable diesel is fully compatible with all diesel engines and the current energy infrastructure, data center operators don’t need to retrofit or upgrade their current assets when making the switch.

In addition to a lower carbon footprint, renewable diesel delivers the same strong performance as fossil diesel, helping data center operators secure operations during power outages.

Renewable diesel also has good storage properties. The fuel is stable and can be stored for a long time without losing quality or absorbing water, making it an ideal choice for a backup energy source.

Around the world, renewable diesel has been helping many heavy-duty sectors, such as road transportation, construction, marine, and agriculture reduce reliance on fossil fuels. A study from Goldman Sachs predicts that AI is poised to drive a 160 percent increase in data center power demand.

More electricity used means more GHG emissions if businesses still rely on fossil fuels as their main energy source – and this is not sustainable. As a proven solution, renewable diesel can do its part in contributing to helping data center operations reduce emissions.

Partnerships around the world

In 2021, the supply of renewable diesel for PowerSecure’s microgrid solutions began in the US. In December 2022, LCL, a data center specialist in Belgium, started using renewable diesel for its emergency power generators.

Fast forward to 2024, ST Telemedia Global Data Centres, one of the world’s fastest-growing data center providers, became the first data center operator in Singapore to power its backup generators with renewable diesel.

More recently in Finland, Verne, a provider of sustainable data center solutions for high-intensity computing, transitioned its operations from fossil to renewable fuels.

Using renewable diesel as a backup fuel source can achieve many goals: protecting investments and assets from being stranded as technology evolves, ensuring critical operations remain uninterrupted during power outages, and with a significantly smaller carbon footprint.