Data Centre LIVE Global 2025: Insights from Ramboll
Taking to the stage at Data Centre LIVE for a fireside chat titled A Practical Roadmap to Sustainable Data Centres, Ed Ansett, Director of Innovation and Sustainability at Ramboll, began by broadening the typical understanding of sustainability.
While carbon is often the focal point, Ed highlighted that achieving true sustainability in data centres involves five key pillars: carbon, circularity, biodiversity, energy reuse and energy export.
“We typically think whole life carbon,” he said, dividing it into embodied carbon – what’s emitted during construction – and operational carbon, which dominates the lifetime footprint.
However, he pointed out that the sector often overlooks other critical areas.
Circularity involves evaluating whether data centre components are reused or end up in landfill.
Biodiversity loss also needs addressing, particularly as new data centre builds often replace natural habitats.
Additionally, there’s untapped potential in repurposing waste energy and exporting excess power to support broader grid decarbonisation efforts.
Practical steps for decarbonisation
When asked about first steps towards decarbonisation, Ed pointed to energy efficiency - a long-standing focus of the industry.
Technologies like liquid cooling are helping reduce power usage effectiveness (PUE), but the focus must now expand to overall energy consumption.
He called out measures such as invoking processor sleep states during idle periods and relocating workloads to regions with lower grid emission factors. “It’s been talked about but not widely implemented,” he said, referencing sleep states. Participation in demand response is another emerging strategy, with data centres supporting the grid by adjusting loads based on renewable availability.
Site selection also plays a critical role: “Where possible, site a data centre where there's a low grid emission factor,” he urged, pointing to Nordic regions as current leaders.
In high-carbon regions, operators might consider off-grid renewable generation as a means to lower operational emissions.
Power purchase agreements (PPAs) were described as a strong step forward, helping fund new renewable energy capacity—even if they can’t guarantee which electrons end up powering the facility.
Embedding circularity and biodiversity from design
Delving into biodiversity, Ed explained the concept of net gain—ensuring any development results in greater biodiversity than was originally on-site.
On circularity, he urged the sector to move away from the linear ‘make-use-dispose’ model.
“We are gradually depleting precious metals and rare earth elements,” he said, citing the role of ‘circularity passports’ in tracking components from deployment to reuse.
This would ensure every element is accounted for throughout its lifecycle, making reuse and recycling easier and more traceable.
Discussing whether data centres can ever reach true zero without carbon offsetting, Ed was honest.
Even renewable energy comes with a footprint.
“Pretty much everything we do, even renewable energy sources, has a finite footprint,” he said, concluding that offsetting will always be needed to some degree.
However, he cautioned against using offsets as a first resort, arguing they should only be a final tool once every other emission has been reduced.
Building a better future through collaboration
As the session closed, Ed emphasised the importance of early expert involvement during the design and planning stages.
With Ramboll’s global network of 300 data centre specialists, he sees early-stage consulting as essential to pushing sustainability outcomes forward: “We have the tools to do it. I think we just need to look at sustainability differently.”
He also underlined the benefits of refurbishing existing buildings rather than always building new.
While not every element can be reused, repurposing structures like warehouses significantly reduces embodied carbon: “Some companies have recognised the benefits of doing this already.”
By exploring overlooked sustainability levers and focusing on practical, achievable steps, Ed’s presentation at Data Centre LIVE offered a clear, grounded roadmap for a more sustainable data centre future.
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