Green data centres make Stockholm unique in the world
The Internet service provider Bahnhof and the energy company Fortum Värme have signed an agreement for large-scale heat recovery from Bahnhof's planned “Green Hub” data centre in central Stockholm. Fortum Värme will be supplying cooling to Bahnhof, which in turn plans to sell back surplus heat to the district heating system. The ability for data centres to sell excess heat, which previously went to waste, at market prices make Stockholm a unique place to establish your operations.
“This is an important step to recovering as much energy as possible from the expanding global IT sector,” says Anders Egelrud CEO at Fortum Värme. "We hope that the Open District Heating business model, which makes this possible, will attract a large number of international data centres to set up in Stockholm, but also helps to accelerate the development of Stockholm towards a totally fossil-free system."
Energy recovery is an additional competitive advantage for Stockholm that offers the opportunity to take a leading position as Europe's primary hub for information and communication technology companies.
“Stockholm, with its proven expertise in the IT sector, its well-developed district heating systems and its excellent business climate is ideally placed to be a global centre for the growing data centre industry,” says Karin Wanngård, financial commissioner at the City of Stockholm. “It is really positive that heat recovery from this future sector can contribute to our vision for making Stockholm an international forerunner in sustainable cities.”
Bahnhof's data centre will be Stockholm's largest when it is established in 2016-2017. When fully developed, it will be able to recover 112 GWh of heat per year to the district heating network. This is equivalent to the entire supply of district heating to a town of about 20,000 inhabitants.
The agreement between Fortum Värme and Bahnhof includes a heat recovery system and a separate system for free cooling.
“Having a heat recovery system and a parallel system for free cooling will allow us to build one of the world's greenest data centres while offering very competitive prices at the same time. With Green Hub, we have demonstrated that it is smart to put data centres in city locations and recover energy instead of heating up the sky,” says Bahnhof CEO Jon Karlung.
The new data centre will get its electricity supplied from a new substation being built by Ellevio which is directly connected to the data centre.
“We will be making a substantial new investment to facilitate Bahnhof's expansion,” says Johan Lindehag, CEO of Ellevio. The proximity to the main grid station in combination with a brand new substation will provide Bahnhof with a secure and scalable grid connection.
About Open District Heating:
The Open District Heating (Fjärrvärme®) business concept, uses proven technology to enable the recovery of energy from which all parties will benefit. Previously it was impossible to utilise excess heat from data centres, which ended up as waste. Fortum has carried out similar set-ups with server halls in Finland. http://www.opendistrictheating.com/
About Fortum Värme:
Fortum Värme produces district heating, district cooling and electricity. The company has contributed to Stockholm being counted among the world's cleanest capital cities and that Stockholm was designated by the EU in 2010 as the world's first environmental capital – Green Capital. Between the years 2010–2015, Fortum Värme invested SEK 7 billion in combined heat and power production in the Stockholm region. District heating in Stockholm will be entirely produced from renewable and recovered energy no later than 2030. The company has 9,500 district heating and cooling customers. The fully owned gas business sells and distributes town and vehicle gas
Fortum Värme is jointly owned by Fortum (90.1% of the shares and 50.1% of the votes) and the City of Stockholm (9.9% of the shares and 49.9% of the votes). In 2013 the owners reached a new shareholder agreement, and from 1 January 2016, ownership of the company will be equally shared. In conjunction with this, the owner's agreed that Fortum Värme would be self-financed as of this date. In April 2015 Fortum Värme received a BBB+ rating from Standard & Poor's with stable prospects.
More information:
Jon Jordås
Press Officer Bahnhof AB
Phone: +46 76 111 01 63
E-mail: jon.jordas@bahnhof.net
Marianne Ahlgren
Press Officer Fortum Värme AB
Phone: +46 72 715 09 39
E-mail: marianne.ahlgren@partners.fortum.com
Tomas Gustavsson
Press secretary Karin Wanngård
Phone: +46 76 122 91 99
E-mail: tomas.gustavsson@stockholm.se
Jonatan Björck
Press Officer Ellevio AB
Phone: +46 72 561 54 16
E-mail: jonatan.bjorck@ellevio.se