ZAP // Dall-E-2
Storing data requires a lot of energy. Storing them in space, where there is always sunlight, seems like a good option. But how do we do this? The good news is that we have gone further. The bad news is that we are still a long way away.
Data centers are the backbone of our digital infrastructure. They support everything from social media platforms to online shopping and streaming services, writes .
As the company explains, data center infrastructure is vital for the continuous functioning of a company. They are physical places whereand all data is saved and accessible in case of emergencies or disasters.
With the rise of artificial intelligence and cloud computing, the amount of data generated and processed daily is extremely large and the demand for data centers is constantly growing.
Unfortunately, the data centers have a huge energy needin addition to a series of other environmental inconveniences. One possible solution is to build them in spaceand several companies are working to make this a reality. But how would this work? Will it really happen?
It is expected that the demand for data centers around the world will increase by around 20% per year in the coming years. In the UK alone, Google, Google and several other US companies are collectively spending €24 billion to increase the capacity of these AI storage centers across the country.
However, data centers built for high-performance computing and AI require much more energy than a typical facility. This generates much more heat, which implies a substantial increase in energy needs of the liquid.
According to the International Energy Agency, data centers accounted for about 1 to 1.5% of global energy use in 2023with this value expected to increase significantly in the coming years. Additionally, cooling systems may in some regions. The crescent electronic waste generated by obsolete equipment is also a major problem.
To try to solve the energy issue, data center companies have invested in renewable energy sourcessuch as wind, solar and nuclear, to reduce their carbon emissions. They are also using advanced cooling technologies to make their data centers more energy efficient.
Even so, it will still be a major challenge to install sufficient capacity. Data centers require a physical space and infrastructure significant, which makes expansion difficult and expensive.
AI takes a step forward, cost takes a step back
American companies like Aeo Project are already looking at Space. Data centers outside the Earth’s atmosphere would have access to continuous solar energy and could be cooled naturally by the vacuum of space.
Away from logistical issues such as planning permission, such facilities could be quickly implemented and expanded as the demand for more data continued to increase. And it’s a very possible idea.
Washington-based Lumen recently raised $11 million (nearly €11 million) in seed funding that will be used to build a full-scale prototype in 2025.
This facility will be oriented towards collecting large amounts of raw data from other satellites, then using AI to grind them up and transmit them to Earth, taking up much less bandwidth than otherwise necessary.
Meanwhile, Ascend completed an 18-month survey last summer that concluded that space data centers are economically and environmentally viableprovided that carbon emissions from launchers can be reduced by about ten times. Backed by French defense giant Thales, it aims launch a gigawatt of capacity into space in the next 25 years.
As with all ideas too good to be (for now) real, we should not, despite everything, have doubts about the challenges involved in this type of projects.
Continues to be extremely expensive launch payloads into orbit, even though companies like Elon Musk’s SpaceX have taken significant steps in reducing cost and increasing reliability of space launches. This fact may limit how quickly space data centers can be launched.
There is also the fact that the latency in communication between Earth and space affect data transmission speeds.
Space weather conditions, such as solar flares, can also disrupt operations, while collisions with debris are a big one.
One advanced armor could protect against things like radiation and micrometeoroidsbut it probably won’t be enough — especially as Earth’s orbit becomes increasingly populated.
To repair damaged installations, advances in robotics and automation They will help, of course, but remote maintenance may not be able to resolve all issues.
So while there is certainly a lot of excitement around this potential answer to our need for more and more data centers, it is clearly as complex as it is compelling. But there is one thing that this idea it is not — unreasonable.
