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SINGAPORE — Singapore is pushing for inexperienced knowledge facilities because the explosive demand for synthetic intelligence places a pressure on vitality sources.
Town-state launched a inexperienced knowledge heart roadmap on Thursday to assist its ambitions for the digital economic system as demand for AI and computing grows.
“As the demand for digital and AI compute continues to rise, the need for data center capacity will grow,” Senior Minister of State for Communications and Info Janil Puthucheary mentioned on Thursday.
The roadmap goals to offer a minimum of 300 megawatts of extra capability within the close to time period, with extra by way of “green energy deployments.”
Plans to offer extra knowledge heart capability embody elevating vitality effectivity of all knowledge facilities in Singapore, deploying energy-efficient IT gear in addition to providing incentives or grants for useful resource effectivity.
“Data centers here also tap on Singapore’s broader international position as a business and digital hub,” Singapore’s Infocomm Media Growth Authority mentioned in a press launch. IMDA promotes and regulates Singapore’s communication and media sectors.
“As demand for AI has grown, so too has demand for energy. This has created strains on national energy networks, which need to be managed in the short term,” Tony Blair Institute for International Change mentioned in a report on Wednesday.
The AI growth has boosted demand for knowledge facilities which home giant quantities of knowledge required to coach and deploy AI fashions, making them extraordinarily vitality intensive.
Whereas corporations like Microsoft and Google are investing closely to extend the usage of clear vitality, governments have to proceed to create the incentives for corporations to take action, mentioned the Tony Blair Institute for International Change.
Knowledge facilities are the “biggest indirect carbon emitter” of the knowledge and communications sector, mentioned Puthucheary. “They contribute to 82% of Singapore’s ICT sector emissions, and account for 7% of Singapore’s total electricity consumption.”
Singapore is the second-largest knowledge heart market in Southeast Asia and the sixth-largest in Asia-Pacific, in response to knowledge from world actual property providers agency Cushman & Wakefield.
Singapore homes greater than 70 cloud, enterprise, and co-location knowledge facilities, which is ready to host cloud platforms, digital providers, and higher-intensity workloads for AI, in response to IMDA.
As the worldwide knowledge heart market hits new highs in 2023, energy limitations have “pushed data center operators to further evaluate untapped and smaller markets worldwide,” mentioned Cushman & Wakefield.
