Microsoft data centre powered by wastewater treatment

A fuel cell power plant installation, recently opened at the Dry Creek Water Reclamation Facility in Cheyenne, Wyoming, utilises renewable biogas as a fuel source to power a nearby Microsoft data centre and supply heat to the facility’s wastewater treatment process. The Direct FuelCell (DFC) technology was developed by FuelCell Energy.

The project uses biogas, produced at the facility following municipal wastewater treatment, to power the fuel cell at the data plant. Anaerobic bacteria produce the biogas while stabilising solids removed from wastewater, and the fuel cell electrochemically converts the biogas into electricity to power the Microsoft IT server container. The process features the absence of combustion - so virtually no pollutants are emitted - and the almost complete absence of nitrogen oxide that causes smog, sulfur dioxide that causes acid rain and particulate matter.

The fuel cell plant is expected to produce up to 300 kW of renewable power, while the data centre will use no more than 200 kW. The data centre will thus operate completely off the grid, with the remaining kilowatts delivered back to the wastewater treatment plant to reduce its electricity bills.

Microsoft and FuelCell Energy came to Siemens with specific parameters for the project. Based on this data, Siemens engineered the power monitoring technology to provide detailed insight into the power generation process so the biogas and fuel cell concept could be shown to produce reliable energy and move the project from pilot to full-scale. The software and hardware monitor the amount of biogas being sent to the fuel cell, the conversion to usable energy and the fuel cell output to ensure that enough electricity is created to reliably power the data centre.

“In any data centre, power quality and reliability is key since the facility must run uninterrupted 24/7 to protect information stored there,” said Siemens Energy Management Division head Kevin Yates. “Siemens’ brightest engineers brought their vast data centre and power industry expertise to build a custom solution that proves resources like biogas and fuel cells can be relied on to provide reliable power to critical installations.”

The technology includes predictive demand alert capability so data centre operators are made immediately aware of any power quality or energy demand issues. Siemens also provided environmental controls inside the data centre to manage air temperature, flow and humidity, as well as circuit breakers to deliver energy to the servers and protect power supply in cases of low or high energy levels within the container.

The project was made possible through a coalition comprising industry, the University of Wyoming, Wyoming Business Council, Cheyenne LEADS, Cheyenne Board of Public Utilities, Western Research Institute and state and local government partners. The State Loan and Investment Board approved a $1.5 million grant in 2012 to help fund the $7.6 million plant, while Microsoft covered the remaining cost.

“Our objective is to transform the way our data centres do business, with greater energy efficacy and a lower environmental impact,” said Microsoft General Manager of Datacenter Services Christian Belady. “By bringing together the power plant with the data centre, we are actually simplifying the power distribution infrastructure and improving efficiency in the distribution of power.”

The power plant began operating on clean natural gas in early 2014 and is now operating on renewable biogas. This project is being evaluated as a template for future potential megawatt-class data centre applications utilising renewable biogas.

“This fuel cell power plant installation can be considered a blueprint for powering data centres with zero- or low-carbon electricity,” said FuelCell Energy President and Chief Executive Officer Chip Bottone. “Our Direct FuelCell (DFC) technology is fuel-flexible, proven and well suited for applications such as these, efficiently converting a waste disposal challenge into renewable power in a carbon-neutral manner that emits virtually zero pollutants.”