Data centres are increasingly important for many businesses, so it is imperative to ensure they are protected from cyber threats. But another important consideration is how sustainable they are too – and there are solutions available. For many businesses, data centres form a crucial part of what they do, but with cyber threats continuing to grow in number, complexity and threat it means it is imperative to protect them effectively.
“When considering the threat landscape and creating an effective cybersecurity strategy, it’s important to understand that threats have evolved to come from all angles,” says Ian Jeffs, UK&I country general manager at Lenovo Infrastructure Solutions Group. “In the past, we’ve thought of security as a fence in which data can flow freely across the business. As you move the compute capability closer to where the data is, the threat surface gets bigger. If an attacker can get at the amount of data that is in a server or storage system, they can access all the operations in the business. It’s potentially an existential threat.”
Ian adds that in the data centre, companies and IT leaders require built-in security systems that can handle complex cyber threats. “It’s also important to recognise the reputational damage caused by a cyberattack,” he says. “It’s not just the loss of data; if you can’t get it back quickly, it can be massively impactful for customer trust and loyalty. In the eyes of the public, transparency is also a crucial element. If a company is hit by a cyberattack, it must be clear about what’s happened, communicate it with its customers, and outline what actions have been implemented to resolve the issue.”
Sustainability concerns
While cybersecurity is a worry about data centres so is sustainability as they can consume large abouts of energy, but there are ways to address this. “There are a multitude of things that businesses can do to make data centres more sustainable,” says Ian. “Technologies such as warm water cooling enable high performance with far less energy use, provided a host of power consumption benefits.
“For instance, in data centres that use warm water cooling, there is much less need for high-speed fans to dissipate heat. Air cooling systems can often consume vast amounts of energy in themselves.
“Furthermore, any wasted heat can be reused effectively because warm water-cooling systems produce heat waste at a temperature that is more easily reused for other purposes. Not only will this improve energy efficiency across an entire data centre facility, but this energy can be successfully recycled in sustainable ways in the wider community.
“By 2030, recycling the heat from data centres will become the norm, from heating nearby buildings and swimming pools to piping warm liquid under roads and walkways to melt ice.”
Circular benefits
There are other ways to boost sustainability, such as by adopting circular economy practices – and this can even help businesses to boost their cybersecurity solutions for their data centres. “Recycling servers brings many business benefits alongside the benefits for the environment,” says Ian. “Asset recovery services can offer a welcome cash boost when old hardware is reused. Recycling older units can also yield benefits in terms of energy use, with newer, more efficient servers often capable of doing the job of 10 or 20 older ones.
“Refreshing hardware also means business leaders can ‘weed out’ older machines which have gone from being business critical to sitting at the back of a data centre drawing power but not doing a great deal. All of this can help to cut emissions and energy bills, opening more resources that can be used to invest in cybersecurity defences.”
However, some businesses have shied away from circular economy practices due to the perceived difficulty of implementing them. But adopting a circular economy practice doesn’t need to be difficult, Ian says. “As long as data centre providers offer tangible solutions to help customers extend the lifecycle of their devices with cost-efficient IT choices,” he explains.
“Opportunities to embrace a circular economy in IT now exist in a way that they did not before. Technological solutions are revolutionising supply chains, product design and materials, allowing organisations to recycle, refurbish and use products and parts as raw materials in manufacturing. In the data centre sector, sustainability services are now enabling data centre operators to refurbish, recycle and reuse in a way that was previously impossible.
“It’s important to recognise that even small, incremental steps will make a difference over the long term. Over the past decade, the adoption of technologies such as better cooling systems have kept the energy demands of data centres relatively stable, but embracing circularity can help to boost efficiency even further.”
Reseller role
Lenovo is playing its part in helping customers to embrace the circular economy. “Lenovo is helping its customers in their own sustainability journey and contributions to the circular economy, enabling reuse or responsible disposal of assets with end-to-end Lenovo services. Lenovo Asset Recovery Services helps mitigate end-of-life IT and data security risks and promotes the reuse of parts wherever possible,” says Ian. “With Lenovo Certified Refurbished, customers can give their devices a new lease of life.
Resellers have a key role in helping customers find the right solutions that will help them embrace the circular economy and drive sustainability. “With customers, investors and the wider world increasingly conscious of the sustainability credentials of the companies they buy from, there has never been a better time to embrace the possibilities of the circular economy in the data centre sector,” Ian says. “Recycling, refurbishing and reusing can help to curb not just e-waste, but also electricity consumption, offering benefits for the environment and for forward-thinking business leaders.”
