Flexential ESG Report 2025: Building for Sustainability

Flexential's latest ESG report has offered a snapshot of how the company is approaching a balancing act in the data centre industry: scale and sustainability.

Customers want more capacity for highly dense workloads, but they also expect facilities to use energy and water more efficiently while maintaining resilient operations.

Flexential's 2025 fiscal year Environmental, Social and Governance report places particular emphasis on improvements across its data centre estate.

It outlines projects aimed at reducing energy consumption and limiting water use while preparing facilities for higher-density computing.

"Every customer we talk to is evaluating partners on how they build and operate, not just on whether they can deliver capacity," said Ryan Mallory, CEO of Flexential.

"Those commitments put us in position to meet the increasing demand for high-density, AI-ready infrastructure without compromising on our standards."

Efficiency projects across the data centre portfolio

The report shows Flexential consumes 402GWh of renewable energy across its operating footprint while continuing work on infrastructure designed to improve operational efficiency.

Among the largest completed projects is an air handling unit retrofit programme spanning 14 data centres, which Flexential expects will deliver 7.1GWh of annual energy savings.

The company is also bringing new facilities online that are designed to achieve a power usage effectiveness (PUE) of 1.4 and a water usage effectiveness (WUE) of zero.

According to the report, around 84% of Flexential's total data centre capacity is now supported by closed-loop cooling systems, which recirculate cooling water instead of relying on continuous fresh water consumption.

The report also highlights progress at individual sites. Portland-Hillsboro 4 has entered service, while Portland-Hillsboro 5 and Atlanta-Douglasville 2 remain on track for completion with the same PUE and WUE design targets.

Flexential's further efficiency work includes the installation of side stream filtration at the Las Vegas-North facility.

The system is projected to save 1.6GWh of energy each year while reducing annual water consumption by 2.6 million gallons.

At Salt Lake City-South Valley, Flexential has completed adiabatic precooling projects designed to reduce peak PUE by 10.4% while lowering annual energy consumption by an estimated 250MWh.

Sam Rudek, Chief Operating Officer at Flexential, says: "We continue to strengthen the systems, processes and oversight mechanisms that support our ability to scale sustainably, manage emerging risks and deliver the resiliency our customers depend on.

"These efforts position Flexential to grow responsibly while maintaining the accountability, transparency and performance standards that define our business.”

Building the workforce behind expanding infrastructure

Alongside investment in physical infrastructure, the report outlines measures aimed at developing the workforce responsible for operating and expanding the company's facilities.

Through Flexential's FlexCares programme, employees are also continuing community partnerships with organisations including Project Helping, A Roof Above, Kids in Need, A Precious Child, Classroom Central and Stolen Lunches.

Governance supports long-term resilience

The report details governance measures that sit behind the operation of modern data centre infrastructure.

Flexential issued a US$800m green asset-backed securities offering aligned with the International Capital Market Association's Green Bond and Green Loan Principles, supporting financing linked to environmental objectives.

The company has also expanded its enterprise-wide Business Continuity Management programme to address growing customer reliance on digital infrastructure alongside complex technology dependencies and more severe weather events.

Continued efforts are being made to strengthen oversight across cybersecurity and data compliance as Flexential develops its wider governance framework.

The projects described in the report show a business investing not only in additional capacity but also in the efficiency and resilience needed to support AI-ready data centres as customer requirements evolve.