A. Green Grid Data Centre Life Cycle Assessment Guidelines:
The Green Grid (an association of ICT professionals seeking to dramatically raise the energy efficiency of data centers) developed the Data Centre Life Cycle Assessment Guidelines , intended for use by data center owners, renters, and operators as a common basis so that impacts are comparable across different centers. The guidelines follow ISO 14040/14044 standards for the general steps in conducting a life cycle assessment of a good or service. The resulting LCA would encompass power generation or “grid mix”, hardware, cooling systems, and building structure. They recommend 7 primary and 2 secondary impact areas that all data centers should assess.
Primary impacts (shall be considered for all data centers):
- Energy consumption during operation
- Raw material depletion for construction of the data center structure
- Raw material depletion for manufacturing of ICT and facility equipment
- Land use and environmental impacts of the facility
- Mix of energy-generating sources used to support operation − Water consumption during operation
- Reuse, recycling, and/or disposal of ICT and facility equipment and materials
Secondary impacts (should be considered if relevant to a given facility):
- Hazardous substance content of data center building and equipment
- Air pollution during operation
B. European Telecommunications Standards Institute:
ETSI, the European Telecommunications Standards Institute, produces globally-applicable standards for Information and Communications Technologies (ICT), General methodology and common requirements (ETSI TS 103 199 V1.1.1 (2011-11)). The multi impact LCA standard is based on ISO 14040 and 14044 (the internationally-accepted LCA standard for any type of product and service).