Data storage today represents 2X the carbon impact of the global airline industry and is continually growing. The cloud technology industry and users need to realize that the legacy cloud is not as green as people think. Cloud service providers may run data centers more effectively than companies with on-premise storage, but it still has a drastic impact on the environment.
The cloud – technology businesses, adjacent technologies, and users – needs a wake up call on sustainability.
More data equals more carbon impact.
We are currently experiencing phenomenal growth in data with 90% of the world’s data created only in the last two years. Moving to any cloud may seem like the right move, but we need to analyze this more closely. Traditional cloud architecture copies and stores data in multiple regional data centers for global availability and redundancy, which puts a 2-6x multiplier on data growth.
Meanwhile, the arrival of AI has garnered a lot of attention, as tech companies are in a rush to add AI-enabled products and services. However, a study found that at the rate of growth that AI is currently expanding, it could consume as much energy as a country the size of the Netherlands by 2027.
There’s also the water needed to cool AI servers, which also has a negative impact on the environment. Microsoft, in its latest sustainability report, revealed that due to their heavy investments in AI development, its water consumption had jumped by 34% between 2021 and 2022, to 6.4 million cubic meters. For a shocking perspective, this is around the size of 2,500 Olympic swimming pools.
A recent study also reveals that the video streaming industry accounts for 4% of global carbon emissions, while the aviation industry accounts for 2%.
Sustainability supersedes creating and storing more data.
The shocking facts about the data, the cloud, and AI all point to an imperative for our industry: store data more sustainably. This includes getting rid of the outdated practice of achieving redundancy with replication.
Now this may sound strange and counterintuitive, coming from a cloud storage CEO, but the future of our shared planet’s environment is critical, and there are smarter, more sustainable alternatives available.
That’s one of the reasons why we created the following educational video on the impact of cloud services on the environment and alternative solutions.
Storj’s commitment to sustainability and innovation.
At Storj, we are doing our part to support innovation while reducing carbon. Storj distributed cloud technology champions sustainability by leveraging existing storage and compute capacity. This avoids up to 83% of the carbon generated using legacy cloud services.
Storj can’t do this alone. Other cloud providers, startups, innovators, and cloud users need to get educated and explore more ideas to further reduce carbon emissions. Storj is a co-founding member of the Digital Sustainability Alliance, which is committed to making the world a cleaner, more livable place through innovative technologies that offer transformative sustainability benefits. Our collective cloud industry can make a difference.
