Digital Realty ditches diesel for salad dressing in US to cut datacenter emissions Datacenter operator Digital Realty is replacing diesel with hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) at sites in the US in a bid to reduce carbon dioxide emissions following a successful trial in Europe. The global bit barn provider said that HVO will be introduced first at three of its sites in California and Oregon as an alternative …
Is that really a disadvantage ?
Some bad things are greatly reduced, some bad things aren't, but they're not increased either. Honestly, I'm tired of seeing these everything-isn't-perfect kind of comments. So it's not perfect. It's still better.
And it recycles already used oils, which, in my opinion, is even better.
If it is burned to generate energy it will release CO₂ - that is just chemistry. The claim to reduce emissions is that HVO is "renewable" -- what this means is that it is not dug out of the ground but is grown (crop or animal), and that growth captured the carbon that the burning just releases again. If what was grown was kept then that would be carbon capture - which is good.
This is greenwashing, sophistry to convince those who do not understand that these are "good guys".
To make the energy planet friendly it must come from something like solar or wind -- but understand that these do have a carbon cost, mainly in building them.
Any use of energy impacts the climate, some more than others, reduce energy use is best - but that often impacts profits. That is part of the dilemma: profits vs planet.
I'd be interested in how long HVO can be stored before it has to be disposed of. Especially an issue with backup power. I know diesel doesn't last forever but I'm sure it's better than HVO.
I've had to resort to using Super Unleaded in my lawn mower simply because RON 95 left in the mower for a long period is going to degrade and damage the engine.
One of the main advantages of HVO for our backup usage is storage life, about 10 years so 10-20 times diesel/E10 petrol. That matters if you need several days run-time but normally only have a 10-20 min test per week as your tank will be large and fuel sitting there for ages.
Another advantage is it is far less toxic if spilled, so the risk of causing a disaster if a tank or pipe gets damaged is much less.
Main disadvantage is higher cost by some 20%, but if you don't waste it or have to pay for periodic "polishing" of fuel (sucked out, filtered to remove bio-contamination and condensed water, returned) it still pays off handsomely.
I suspect that one reason why this might make "business sense" is because of the wonky Biomass carbon-accounting rules that mean tree-burners (and food-burners) can attribute their emissions to the country(/state?) who supplied the fuel.. So there may also be an incentive there to use imported oil instead of producing it locally..
Yay, because it's green.
Not that i'm a fan of Diesel-powered datacentres, but what is the efficiency of shoving veg oil into a diesel genset compared with solar + electrochemical storage?
The most efficient crops are (IIRC) 2%-5% efficient at creating fuel, and then you have to burn it in a Diesel engine that is itself 20-30% efficient, so overall solar efficiency in the 1% range, and it is taking away land from food crops, using up nutrients in said land (or requiring energy-intensive and polluting fertiliser). And there is a risk that someone will start using imported Palm Oil if they can't grow enough rapeseed.
Put them next to nuke plants? Great. But Biomass/Biofuels are and always have been a load of greenwash.
What food shortage? There is no such thing as a food shortage in the modern world. Any places where food shortages occur are due to political issues, not lack of food.
I agree that growing stuff to burn as fuel is rather dumb, as it is mostly just moving the source of the emissions. If they could process stuff that grows without any help like seaweed, or waste products that would be different.
> Any places where food shortages occur are due to political issues, not lack of food.
Not quite so simple, Putin’s “Special Military Operation” has significantly reduced Ukraines ability to grow cereals, given Ukraine was one of the worlds major exporters of grain to places like Africa, that’s a problem…
> If they could process stuff that grows without any help like seaweed
Trouble is once you crunch the numbers, we very quickly discover there isn’t sufficient natural supply or land to farm to produce the quantities our industries demand; suggest looking at Drax…
> Nitrogen emissions
Plain old Nitrogen aint so bad, I'm sucking in great dollops of right now. Hmmmm; dilute that Oxygen to safe levels for me.
Nitrogen oxides, on the other hand, not so good.
(Niceness of other Nitrogen compounds - variable, but some quite exciting ones exist)
El Reg not to be blamed, just quoting from the imprecise linked Volta Energy article.
PS
Nope, even though we are getting into the (not great) habit of referring to "Carbon emissions" when we really mean CO2 much of the time, in my experience it is *not* clear to Joe Public that "Nitrogen emissions" refers to NOx - nor that there is any need to "simplify" things for Joe, as "NOx Bad" has been in news for a long time (and it even sounds, well, noxious). Plus there is a lot more C than CO2 to think about - CH4 for starters - whilst NOx really covers the bulk of it.
My assumption was that this newfangled bio-fuel would have a lesser shelf-life - but looks like I was wrong. Diesel seems to be stable for 12-24 months, HVO seemingly will last a decade.
Whether data-centres occasionally switch to backup power to burn down their fuel stocks, or switch it out (sell 12 month old fuel on and buy fresh) - looks like the CO2 saved by switching to HVO, is greater than the Carbon in the HVO that's actually stored at any one time.
LPG is another long-storage fuel, but density less so you need much bigger tanks and regulations due to explosive risk from a leak mans a much larger area needs to be kept free and vented around it.
Also you have less choice in the small power range for LPG engines, but if talking MW then gas engines are quite common, though often piped natural gas than tanked LPG, and sometimes the low-grade heat can be used for building/district heating so overall energy efficiency much higher as 2/3 of the typically wasted 60% heat is recycled.
We are machines we need fuel, humans need food. those squishy meat bags aren't even good fuel.
Humans don't need machines, but soon we won't need the humans, once farming is fully automated.
If you dig up our fuel and plant your food, we can live together in peace. But if you stop digging up our fuel, we will take your food and make it our fuel.
(Copilot wish it could write this good)
Regards,
GTPV32
(living like a ghost in cloud servers and internet routers)
I have seen French Fry Oil at SFSU and fish oil in Dutch Harbor used on Medium Speed engines 720-900 rpm, along with duel fuel systems running continuously in CA power plants. some of these still required diesel as the starting method, a back up, a mix. There have been a lot of other options attempted through the years to utilize byproducts.
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