The Future of Sustainable Data Centres: Grid Stability, Digital Twins and AI

In this episode of the Climate Confident podcast, I sit down with Ciaran Flanagan, who leads Siemens’ Global Data Centre business, to unpack the evolving role of data centres in our energy and climate systems.

We dig into the data centre’s journey from a “sausage machine” of power-hungry servers to a potential hero in grid stability and renewable energy adoption. Ciaran shares how data centres in Ireland, despite consuming up to 20% of national electricity, are driving economic growth and pioneering greener practices.

We explore why digital twins are more than a buzzword, enabling smarter design and cutting resource waste. Ciaran also explains how AI’s explosive demand pressures the grid while offering real-time energy optimisations to make data centres more sustainable.

Key highlights:

• The role of data centres as catalysts for renewable energy growth
• How digital twin technology can cut construction emissions and energy use
• AI’s double-edged impact on data centre sustainability
• The regulatory shift pushing data centre operators to report and reduce emissions

We also touch on the often-overlooked economic benefits of data centres, from direct jobs to the broader tech ecosystem.

The report I referred to in the podcast is available here.

Listen in to learn how the data centre industry is pivoting from climate problem to climate solution.

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Transcript

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Data center operators are quite innovative, and quite aggressive at driving out every watt of waste energy. And that's really important because just because it's renewable energy doesn't mean you should waste it. Good morning, good afternoon, or good evening, wherever you are in the world. Welcome to episode 224 of the Climate Confident Podcast, the go-to show for best practices in climate emission reductions and removals. I'm your host, Tom Raftery, and if you haven't already, be sure to follow this podcast in your podcast, app of choice, so you never miss an episode. Before we get going, a huge thank you to this podcast's, incredible supporters, Jerry Sweeney, Andreas Werner, Steven Carroll, and Roger Arnold. Your backing helps keep this podcast going and I truly appreciate each and every one of you. If you get value from this podcast and you'd like to help me continue it, you can support the show as well for as little as three euros or dollars a month, which is less than the cost of a cup of coffee, you just have to click on the support link in the show notes or visit tiny url.com/climate pod. Now today's guest is someone who's seen the inside of data centers from every angle, from construction to operations, from grid balancing to AI innovation. Ciaran Flanagan doesn't just work in data centers. He helps shape how they're built and run and how they fit into a more sustainable energy future. With decades of experience advising operators, investors, and policy makers, he's become a trusted voice on how data infrastructure can drive not only business growth, but also climate progress. In our chat today, we'll unpack how data centers have become key players in decarbonizing the grid, why digital twins are rewriting the rules of design and how AI is both a challenge and an opportunity in this space. But before that, in the coming weeks, I'll be speaking with Stuart Thompson, who's president of ABB Electrification Services, Frank McGuire, who's VP Insights, Strategy and Sustainability for Sharethrough Kanika Chandaria, who's climate lead for Agreena, and Ori, who's second name I'm not going to try and pronounce right now, who's the co-founder and CCO of Giga Blue. Now back to today's show, and as I mentioned, my special guest today is Ciaran. Ciaran, welcome to the podcast. Would you like to introduce yourself? Hey, good morning, Tom. Yes. and, And thanks for the opportunity. My name's Ciaran Flanagan. And I run the global data center business for Siemens. Talking to you this morning from Dublin, Ireland. to Great Fantastic. Another Irish man. Love to, love to have it Don't have enough Irish people on the podcast. So welcome. We'll do our best. We'll do our best, Tom. Super, uh, Ciaran, Siemens and data centers. And you said data center business. So it's not that you're running the Siemens data centers. It's that you're running a data center business that Siemens operates. So interesting, because if I go to my kitchen now, know, I have a dishwasher, which is made by Siemens. I have a hob that's made by Siemens. I have a fridge that's made by Siemens and I've had guests on the show before from Siemens who do things like they make car chargers and things to make buildings run more efficiently, the smart infrastructure. So what is it that Siemens are doing for data centers? Great question, Tom, and a question I'm very often asked. We're essentially a technology provider to all of the major and mid-market and even smaller data center operators around the world. So when we think about the technology we provide, we provide a lot of the electrification or the power delivery systems for our customers. We provide a lot of safety and security systems for our customers around the world. And also quite interestingly for me, at least we also do quite a bit on software. We do a lot of the control systems, the automation systems that our customers use to digitise their data center operations and to run them efficiently. So you would call us a technology provider in the data center value chain. Okay. And full disclosure for people listening, I come from a data center background myself. I was involved in the development of a data center in Ireland in Cork back 2006 to 2008 called Cork Internet Exchange. That data center is still in operation, although I'm no longer associated with it. So I know a little bit about data centers from that, but maybe not everyone listening would know as much about data centers, Ciaran, as you and I. So maybe give us a quick 101 on data centers in Ireland, globally, and set a bit of context as well around why Ireland is such a particular case because from recollection, Ireland's, well, from recollection, Ireland is a small country, roughly 5 million people on the island. And there are a lot of data centers in Ireland because a lot of technology companies have their global headquarter, their European headquarters, at least in Ireland, that have big data centers that run out of Ireland and consequently, data centers take up probably around 25 percent of the energy market in Ireland, which is way outsized compared to how much it takes in most other countries and, as a consequence it's become a bit of a lightning rod issue in the country. So maybe set a bit of context there. Talk about data centres, set a bit of context around the Irish case, and then we'll, we'll move out to global. sure, sure. So let, let's set a bit of context on data center for, for maybe some, some of the audience that aren't that familiar. And I, I'll try to be, deliberately facetious. So when I think about data centers. I think about a sausage machine, right? I think about data and electricity going in and services coming out. And, essentially, Tom, a data center's raw material is, is data. And and it's electricity. And in essence, a data center is a building that provides the controlled environment to allow that sausage machine to work, right? Let's just call it that for the moment. It gives the operator the cloud provider, whoever it is a very specific environment with reliable power, reliable cooling and reliable environmental control. So that that's it. In a nutshell, that's what the data center is. Now, you asked the question specifically about Ireland. Obviously, I'm Irish. You're Irish. It's an interesting question for us. Ireland came from being a largely agricultural society to being a service-based society or or software engineering economy and a lot of software engineering. So we skipped, the industrial age. And I'm not sure whether that at the time was to our advantage or a disadvantage. You know, but clearly from a government investment point of view, back in the eighties, there was a big, big focus on attracting in high tech, you know, pharma, all of pharma, semiconductor computing, that kind of investment into Ireland. And that was the genesis of the industry we see today, because what happened then is that we started to build up some expertise in the nascent data center industry back in the nineties. People say to me, is it about the tax? I think it's part of the story it's certainly not about the cost of energy. And I'll come back to that. I think the reason that our economy has benefited so much from from the data center growth is that we were in the right place at the right time in the late nineties, and we'd already attracted in a lot of the emergent players at the time to set up their European headquarters in Dublin. Right. So that was kind of the genesis, of how it started. And, some of the early investors in the data center industry in Ireland, obviously were, you know, Microsoft were probably one of the earliest. And then we had a long, history or a long journey through the 2,000's And you know, up to probably three or four years ago, where we were one of the preferred locations for data center investment in Europe. I think if we look at the economy, the economic impact, it's been significant clearly. When the big investors come to any country there's a flywheel effect, right? So it starts to build up expertise. It starts to attract the mid-market players. It starts to attract companies like Siemens to support the industry. You get service organisations wrapped around it. And over a period of time, you then get an industry that you can measure as opposed to just point solutions for corporate consumption. The cloud transition back in the early 2010s a little bit like what we're seeing with a AI now, Ireland was well positioned to participate in some of the early cloud investments because we have already had some experience of how to put data centers together and how to do them cost effectively relative to some of the other markets. So that's kind of the history. Now you brought up a really interesting point and one that I, I do like to address. So yes disproportionately relative to some of our other European neighbors, we have a high degree of energy consumption related to data center for sure. I think my latest data is it's about 20%. And if you compare that to, you know, UK, Germany, Netherlands, France, they're all in the sort of two to 3%, However, if you look at Germany, for example, Germany's got a huge industrial base that also uses energy, which we don't have. So we've got pharmaceuticals, and we've got tech, and then we got, we got the ancillary industries that sit around it. So, an argument I would make is that, okay, if it's not going to be data centers that uses 20% of our, electricity. What is it? Because here's the thing, and the OECD have published many papers on this. Modern progressive economies need to make sure that a certain proportion of their energy generation is used for GDP activity. Right, so there's kind of this theory that a 70 30 mix, so 30 of your your electricity generation should be going to industrial applications that you generate GDP, and 70% will go to residential and support, right? And that's the situation in Germany, that's the situation in the UK, and that's the situation in most modern economies now I'm not trying to avoid the issue because there's a bigger issue here, but I do wanna make the point that when you look at the ratio of GDP industrial load versus residential and non-industrial load, we're not a lot different to countries like Germany who make cars or, you know, countries like UK and who've got an oil and gas industry or science industry. So that's, that's kind of the macro view. Within the industry then, I think we need to do a, or continue to advocate for the benefit that we bring to the economies, right? So there's the GDP piece, right? There's a lot of people in Ireland and across Europe, but let's talk, Tech Ireland that are employed directly by the tech companies and use the data centers that are employed by the organisations that support the data centers and that are employed by all the ancillary businesses outside that that also feed into the tech industry, right? So it is very much a beating, beating heart of our economy. When we look at the energy situation here, I, try to take a more well, I always try to take a more balanced view, but I'm more, I'm a little bit less just on the data center side, meaning that I see the argument that's being made by people that we need to have more balance in our economy, in our energy consumption. And notwithstanding the point I made about mix I mean, I think we've got challenges with, you know, making sure our grid matures along, in tandem with this industry. We've got challenges with bringing in renewable energy into our grids and then I think we've got challenges ahead in how we manage our grid, how we balance loads, how we discriminate, how we manage dispatchable, how we blend in and out different resources. If I look forward, I really think that the data center industry has been one of the driving forces behind the the adoption of PPAs, energy purchase agreements, and the bringing on of renewables into our grid, you know, these are the loads that, that can use these renewables that can underwrite these investments. So my view for the future is that the data center industry will continue to be a catalyst for bringing renewables into the grid. And then government and regulation will need to respond to make sure that the grid is fit for purpose and that the commercial model around the grid makes it an attractive proposition for both the suppliers and the consumers. Long answer. Sorry. no, no, no, no, that's fine. That's fine. And just spell it out for people. What do data centers contribute to the economy? Cause it's not like they're employing a lot of people. No, absolutely. I mean, I think the employability discussion is, is quite topical. Yes, when the data center is up and running the steady state data center does not employ a lot of people, but there's probably three parts to what the data center does do for the economy. Number one is it allows industries around the data center. Either tech industries you know, software industries, or even supporting industries to build businesses where they can support these data centers, because even though you look at a data center with, let's say, 20 people on site running the data center, there are hundreds of people in supporting organisations that sit around that data center supporting the power systems, the cooling systems, the IT systems, all of that. So that's number one. I think the second part of the economic benefit for the country relates to making sure that a country can stay at the front end of technology. Can be net contributor to the technological development of economies and societies. And if we don't embrace the data center as the beating heart of the technology industry we're in danger of getting left behind. If we look forward, we will start to see the data center industry evolve beyond just these big, big, massive cloud data centers. We start to see other applications of AI data centers, inference, maybe edge data centers, all of these technologies and all of these instances of data center are part of how an economy competes, and we need to be able to compete in the world, you know, in the world with all of those other economies. So the economic benefit, I mean, there's there's a, there's a recent PwC report that looks at it for the US. It's quite remarkable when you spread the net beyond the physical building, and you look at the tech companies that sit near it, the support organisations that sit near it, and all of the supporting jobs that are generated as a result. And I would also say that as the industry matures, we now go into the, the retrofit, the refurb, the remediation type cycles with a lot of data centers. Again, creates you know, engineering, construction, project management requirements for all of these data centers. And I think that is, again, part of the beating heart of the economic value of the data center. Okay. And this is the Climate Confident podcast. Can data centers be climate heroes rather than climate villains? And if so, how Yeah, it is the podcast. Yeah. Tough question, right? So I think in general the data center industry has had a very, very long, hard look at itself and its impact in society. And I think that, quite frankly, people who claim to be able to build data centers, you know, I, I'm gonna build a brand new data center and it's gonna be net zero. I think we need to move away from that narrative because a) nobody believes it and b), it's probably not true. Right. Everything we do as as humanity has some impact. Right. So I don't think it's necessarily about net zero. But what I do think it's about, Tom, it's about making sure that the, benefit, the net benefit of having the data center, or the data center industry is greater than the impact. Right. So when we talk to our customers at Siemens, we're absolutely honest with the number one thing to do is is strive to consume renewable energy. Take the carbon out of the energy supply chain. We look at the humble washing machine. Electrolux did a study a couple of years back where they said that 85% of the sustainability impact of the washing machine happens from the day you buy it and use it to the day you, dispose of it because of the energy consumption. The real trick here is to make sure that the data center industry not only uses renewable energy, but is also a catalyst for the decarbonisation of the grid. So the loads that that the data center will use can help underwrite the investments that need to be made to build up those renewable sources, you know, solar, wind, whatever it is. So that, that's one piece of it. The second piece is efficiency and effectiveness. Data center performance has, come on in leaps and bounds over the past 25 years, for sure, in terms of microprocessors, in terms of networking, but also in terms of energy consumption. So data center operators are quite innovative. And quite aggressive at driving out every watt of waste energy. And that's really important because just because it's renewable energy doesn't mean you should waste it. And then the last piece of the puzzle that I think helps us become part of the sustainability story for our grids is that data centers will now become part of the grid ecosystem. They will partner with utility companies. So instead of a utility company having to build another gas fired power plant, perhaps, they can use excess energy storage capacity from a set of data centers that sit on the grid. So when you look at the grid and the power system in its entirety, you can see that everybody's got a part to play. My view and my own personal view is that the net impact of technology has been to make us more efficient at how we go about our daily lives, how we operate society, whether it's agriculture or transport or, or medicine or any of these human endeavors has become more efficient because of what we've been able to do with data. And that will continue. The challenge now is to make sure that as an industry, we're incrementally improving our sustainability performance year on year. So for me, it's not about making a claim about net zero today, it's about being confident with our customers and what we we at Siemens do to incrementally improve every year the performance so that we're on a journey to some point in the future where we can say that our impact on the planet is a lot less than the benefit we bring. Sure, sure. And I mean, data centers typically have backup power, battery storage sophisticated energy systems. So to your point, do you think they could become grid stabilising assets through demand response programs and rather than being seen as a villain in the energy system, actually become a hero stepping in and stabilising the grid, as I said, when there are times when demand is high, they go off grid, go on on site generation, hopefully renewable generation. And as I say, they have big battery storage systems as It, it should be the case that they can help the energy systems rather than being seen as a problem. Yeah, absolutely, Tom. certainly in Europe and some of the Asian countries. There's a very clear legislative direction to make these large energy consumers participate, more in the grid. And to your point, exactly if they've got large storage of energy or if they've got availability of, of, fast, rapid dispatchable energy sources like a gas turbine. They want to be part of the grid so that the grid operator can call on them at you know, at times of need. And quite frankly, so the grid operators can avoid the need to build capacity for peaks. You might have five gigawatts in Ireland, and then one day of the year we need to go to six gigawatts. It's a shame to have to build a gigawatt power plant just for that one spike. So there is a role for the data center to play, but we have two challenges. And I think the two challenges are pretty much common across most of the countries that, that I'm working in or most of the countries that the data center industry operates in. Number one, in a lot of cases the grid is not quite yet fit for purpose to really manage this bidirectional flow of energy. I'm careful not to say it's, it it doesn't work because it does. And, And there are many good examples. But as an entirety, I don't think we're in a situation today where we can say, we can put loads on the grid and we can we can run them bidirectional. We're not there yet. There's a technology investment element that needs to catch up and, it will, right? The second challenge, and this is the one that's a little bit technically easier to resolve, but probably politically more difficult, is the commercial model around how that works. The legislation, the rules, the regulations. What are the rules for a 100 megawatt data center to, you know, set up in country X and to participate in the grid? What are the requirements that that data center will have to comply with above and beyond? And what is the commercial model that allows them to monetise or let's say incentivise the correct behavior? We're not there yet. Okay, so they're the two elements that are coming into focus. Over time, we will get better, but there are some really good examples in the UK, in Germany, in the US, where data centers are significantly critical parts of the local grid and the reliability of the local grid. And, And I hope we see more of that. Likewise, likewise, I'm sure we will. Switching gears, Ciaran. Siemens issued a, or published a technical report not so long ago. In it you talked about, and you were one of the authors of the report, in it Hmm. you talked about the merging of the real and the digital worlds. So, can you tell me what does that mean practically for a data center? Yeah. So the concept of the real and digital world is, it's like the old saying, measure twice, cut once. So, what we wanna do, we wanna be, and, and by the way, this is a concept that has been, well tested, well proven in, in automotive manufacturing in oil and gas, in, in aeronautics, many, many industries. But the concept is that rather than building the data center outta the ground and measure as you go and you know, buy resources and consume resources as you go, you build it entirely in a digital model first, and you predict what you need to put the data center in the ground. You predict what the layout will look like, and you predict what the issues will be with constructability and manufacturability. And it goes all the way from putting the steel in the ground, all the way to laying out the servers in the server room and how they behave. We did some work a couple of years ago and PwC also did a similar report a couple of years ago that showed, construction projects that use digital twin technology can save up to 25% of input resources like you know, concrete, cement, wood, timber, all all of those, because what you're effectively doing is you're building it in in a digital model and you're the digital model is telling you precisely what you need. So you're not buying extra just in case or not a lot. We're also using digital twin to allow us construct the data center in modules offsite. So now a construction project has a lot less people on the site, driving to the site, getting hurt on the site, more people at the factory in a controlled environment where you can build it to a high quality and build it once and build it again and again if you need to. So again, the construction program for the developer becomes a lot shorter. So he's a lot less time on site. A lot less impact on the community around him with trucks and all of that. So that's it in the construction phase and, and the benefits of digital twin in construction have come up from building information, modeling from AutoCAD in the past. It's pretty well proven in many industries, it's just the data center industry is really only coming into this domain now. Once you've built the data center you've got all of this digital representation of your asset, and, it's a shame to just, start running it and, forget about all that data. That data now becomes part of your operations model. So now you're using that data to run the building, to run the data center, to operate the data center. And you're using that data to make sure everybody in your organisation and your suppliers, everybody knows when they're talking about your data center, they've got maybe access to your digital twin and they can see where everything is fitting and laid out and they can be more effective. We're starting to see, for example, using digital twin and AI technology to predict thermal loads. So helping customers design cooling that is right sized for the thermal load, not oversized.'cause when you oversize thermal rejection, you're spending money on electricity. You're spending money on capital equipment. And quite frankly, you're probably running the data center too cold. So the application for digital twin goes all the way from planning and design right out to operations and, and energy consumption at the other end and everything in between. And I think it's an exciting time. I mean, I think this is evolving for us in the data center industry, but we've got some really good proof points already where we've been able to demonstrate to our customers taking a digital twin, combining the real and the digital worlds has made them more efficient and more effective. Okay. And obviously the topic du jour these days has to be AI. Do you think aI is a sustainability friend or foe in the data center world? Because it seems to be both increasing workloads and also helping optimise operations. Yes. I recently spoke to, somebody about this concept of the trilema, a dilemma with a third leg. Look, the data center industry is, really looking to, you know, have energy available, when it needs it. It wants it to be sustainable, and it also needs it to be reliable, and it's very difficult when, you know, when AI came along and put all this pressure on demand, the availability of energy significantly was challenged, and we saw a lot of the the large hyperscalers saying, You know what? Our 2030 commitments our 2040 commitments. We're gonna have to step back a little bit because if we're going to do this AI thing in the short term, we're not gonna be able to make it all about renewables. So we've got this short term issue with matching AI demand and renewable energy. That's slowly getting better and it'll get better on on two fronts. You know, the AI Workloads will become more efficient. You know, we saw what NVIDIA said at GTC. We saw what Deepseek did. So the AI workloads will get more efficient and the renewable energy adoption on the grid will continue to increase. So I'm I'm confident that we will get to a point soon, probably in the next two or three years where we've really addressed that challenge. Certainly we would encourage and we would, engage with our customers that regardless of whether it's a cloud data center or an enterprise data center or an AI data center you know, we really need to be looking at making sure that we can do it with renewable energy and we can do it efficiently and we can help them manage the data. But the challenge that the AI industry has is that the loads are so large and they come, up, you know, they demand them so quickly that sometimes the only option in the short term is fossil based energy generation. And over time we will see, that circle being squared if you like. So that's the energy piece. I'm, I'm confident and I'm optimistic on that piece. AI then also has the potential to transform how we run data centers, right? And, let's think about three elements of the data center, the compute load notoriously underutilised architectures and serve server architectures in this industry, not so much in AI itself, but if you look at the industry at large, it's notoriously underutilised. So there's a lot more impact and a lot more benefit that customers and that operators can get by using AI to better manage their workloads, potentially Tom using AI to better write software. I, I was shocked to see that, you know, if you write something with Ruby on Rails versus C, the energy impact is like four x or something. It's it's quite remarkable. So I think that's one one element. I think also we we're going to see AI really helping customers be more efficient in how they consume energy and you know how they cool the data center as well. So that will help on the consumption side. And I think that will make the data centers net more efficient in, in the long term than they are today. So overall, I think we're in this situation over the next now and in the next couple of years where we gotta get renewables caught up and then a brighter future with more efficient data centers in the longer term. One other aspect I think that's potentially important as well in terms of AI is Google released AlphaChip. don't know if you came across that, but AlphaChip is an AI which designs chips for AI. Starting to get very meta and makes them more efficient. And then you start getting, you will start getting AI chips designed by AlphaChip which then start designing more chips that are even more efficient and so we'll hopefully start to get a positive reinforcement loop happening there as well. But anyway, let's talk a little bit about design, regulation, future proofing of data centers. What do you think? What do you think is the most underrated decision in designing a sustainable data center? I think the most under exploited opportunity in the data center and running the data center is the data itself. The operational data. Let me let me divide that into two pieces. So when we think about how the data center is run, it's really all about making sure that you squeeze out every watt of waste, right? And to do that, you really need to have a data centric approach. I mean, most of our customers will, will tell us that they do not believe that they can really drive sustainability to the next level without having some clear digital transformation as part of that puzzle. So there's a lot of operational data in a data center in, you know, in any industrial context, but there's a lot of operational data that can point customers that can point operators to ways of doing things more efficiently and more effectively. If I look at the way we, build the data centers today, you know, we we buy all the equipment, we put it all together, and then we buy a control system afterwards. And then we, we, we we use that to get it all to work. So I think the the real untapped benefit for data centers and running data centers relates to the data. The second part of that I think that I've I've started to sense is that in data centers many, many different technologies run together and they've all got their control systems. And they all need to communicate with each other. So there's a lot of APIs and interapplication layers and enterprise buses and all of this, what would you call it, like lateral data transfer between systems. And it becomes very complex very quickly. Perhaps in the future, we don't do that with the applications. We just have all the applications addressing the same data set. So the interoperability happens in the data. It becomes part of the data set and not part of the application. So if, system A sends some information or detects something, it makes it available in the data set, everybody else can read it, that's it. So you don't have to get into, and I I don't wanna oversimplify it Tom,'cause I'm not a software engineer, or I haven't been for a long time, but, but you don't have to get into this kind of proprietary, my system doesn't work with your system, holding back this innovation. So at Siemens, we really want to advocate for the open protocol type data strategy for our customers, and we think that the digitalisation of their operations will require that. And we also think that as operations get digitised, they inherently become more efficient, ergo more sustainable. I tend to agree. How much of your work now is shaped by regulatory requirements versus client demand versus internal climate goals? Right now, honestly, Tom, the dominant factor is client demand for sure. Right. The the data center industry is still in a in, in a very, very buoyant growth phase. And it's not just about AI, right? AI is still a relatively small part of the overall industry. Demand for services is what's driving the industry and and what's driving us. But the second part of your question is, is, is really interesting. I mean, I think that regulation is certainly changing the landscape for how our customers look at their data centers from the operational phase onwards, and it's required. We go back to data, right? You know, the the European Energy Directive, it demands that center operators have access to an up-to-date data on what's going on in their data center from a resource perspective, from a, an energy perspective and a sustainability perspective at large. Interestingly, it doesn't necessarily demand performance yet. That's the journey that the industry's on. Like many industries, we're really trying to get get our heads around what data we need you know, to drive more, responsible sustainability behavior. But that will come in time. The regulation and and the legislation this is a topic that I I, I enjoy as well. So one of the leading industry commentators Uptime Institute just just published something, I think, last week posing the question, you know, with the advent of the new, the new administration in the US, do the US data center operators take their foot off the gas, if you pardon the pun. Yes, perhaps they could, but Uptime would contend, and we would agree, that probably not the wisest idea, because still in, in, you know, in the US there's state level legislation that's going to have to be complied with. But more importantly, the data center's customers, the people who buy their services and the stakeholders, the people who live around them will still want to see responsible behavior, So whether it's driven, through legislation or driven through other methods, the requirement to be sustainable, to be responsible is still very much there. Now, we see the European Union taking a very forward approach with this. We're starting to see it in, in Saudi Arabia, for example, there's new legislation coming. Malaysia, China, many, many geographies are starting to legislate around energy consumption in their economies. And they're starting to look to data centers as one of the big loads to be able to account for their performance. So I think right now, the challenge in legislation is being able to measure what we've got. I think in the future then we will start to see more KPIs. But legislation levels the playing field. Overall, I think regulation and legislation is generally a positive intervention, if it's done properly, and if it's done in conjunction with the industry, Okay. Switching gears again, you're, you're from Ireland. Like I am. I credit that in part, at least with my love of sustainability. What about yourself? Do you think it's shaped your thinking on sustainability and innovation? Very, very, much. And I think that, you know, many people that I work with and and I meet, you know, are are, you know, many people I meet are pursuing studies and they're, they're reading up on sustainability. I, don't, you know, I don't want to say that I'm a a fanatic. But, but what I do want to, I'm not, like, seriously, I'm not, my, my car. I don't drive an electric car yet. And we can debate about whether that would be sustainable or not, you know, on another podcast, but, but I do want to understand, and I think, I think we all want to understand, and something that I think about when I talk to customers or or or engage with people on the subject of sustainability, we can talk, you know, we talk about what we do and Siemens we're, you know, we are really working hard to be part of the sustainability equation for our customers across many industries. on the planet. It's still going up. hasn't slowed down, right? And we've been talking about this now for probably 20 years. I'm disappointed with COP. I'm disappointed with the fact that governments can't collectively agree on ways forward. I'm concerned that, you know, maybe democracy isn't even fit for purpose for the challenge we have ahead of us. But what I wanna do now is inform myself. And I think my generation, this generation, that's gotta be one of our missions is to make sure we understand this so we can pass on a good understanding to the next generation and they're already on it anyway. I see that with my, with my daughters. They're much more sustainably aware than I am. Fair, good, good to hear. And speaking of Ireland, Siemens has been in Ireland for now a hundred years. Congratulations on that milestone. Starting, if I read correctly, it started with the Ardnacrusha project, the electrification of Ireland back in 1925, thereabouts. How do you think that legacy influences how Siemens shows up in sustainability today? I think the Siemens heritage obviously a hundred years is is, is a long time. And in fact, Siemens had been participating in the Irish economy before that. It was formed you know, a hundred years ago with the Ardnacrusha project. We would like to think, I as Siemens, we would like to think that we have been one of the key contributors to driving the economy forward all through those 100 years, and particularly around electrification. Electrification transformed economies. Electrification is still considered to be a transformative element of any economy. And we're going to see, you know, we're going to see much, much more electrification. I think our heritage in, in being that, It being in, participating in that nation building role stands to us well. And, and it, it gives us a lot of credibility in the market today. And we still work with many of those cus we still work with the ESB, the electricity supply board here in Ireland. We're still a you know, a very significant partner for them as they build out the next generation grid and power infrastructure. And and obviously at Siemens, we're very proud to be there, but yeah, the heritage means a lot to Siemens and it means a lot to Siemens employees in Ireland. Now I'm only here three years, so I can't claim any credit for it, but, but still it, it, it feels good to be part of a company that's been so much a part of the development of the economy over such a long term. Okay. And the tech report outlines a lot of sectoral crossover, pharma, food, energy. What do data centers need to learn from other sectors right now? Yeah, it's a good point. In fact, I was talking to a customer very recently. And we were talking about doing a technology day, and I was saying to him, we, we will go to one of your data centers and we will, we'll, bring in our, our organisation, our technology people and your technology people. And he said to me, Ciaran, lemme stop you right there. Let's not go to a data center. We've seen enough data centers. Can we go to a, a bottling plant? Can we go to an airline factory? Can we go to a trail maintenance yard? Can we go somewhere else so we can see what's going on? And a good example is you know, one of the big, big automotive companies, they've now started deploying this new technology we've got called Virtual PLC. So it's like the, the old PLC in a box, but now, now it's a virtual instance on a, on a, on a computing device. And they've learned a lot, and they're learning a lot about what Virtual PLC means. And we've started to, to connect some of our customers in industry with some of our data center customers. And it's, it's remarkable. It's it's really remarkable how the crossover happens. And I think it's kind of a unique value that Siemens and and a couple of other, let's say, large multinational players like us have, in that we can introduce customers from different industries to talk to each other and learn from each other, because some of the, some of the challenges we have in data centers, it's a relatively new industry, Tom. They're they're relatively new challenges They've, they've perhaps been solved by older, more established industries. So, yeah, it's it's a great opportunity for us. And there is a lot of crossover. Yeah. Great. Great. If, Ciaran, if you had unlimited resources and zero constraints, what's the dream data center innovation you'd create? I go back to being able to power all of the world's data centers with renewable energy. That's where we, where we, we just absolutely nearly eliminate all of the impact and then all of the benefit is net benefit. That, that for me, the renewables you know, and, and, and being able to manage renewables and being able to drive energy efficiency, that, that's where it's at. But yeah, if, if unlimited resources and yeah, a a world where all data centers are are powered by renewable energy. Fantastic. Great. Left field question. If you could have any person or character alive or dead? real or fictional as a spokesperson for sustainable data centers or an evangelist for sustainable data centers, who would it be and why? Ooh, That's a great question, Tom. you know, I kind of think that the spokespersons for the industry. I think we will really say we will really have have crossed the Rubicon in, in terms of making sure that we're we're fully understood when we get communities advocating on our behalf. Right. So the spokesperson for the industry is probably somebody in a region or a county or a county council or a, a local authority who's been trying to, you know, make sustainability happen and sees sees data centers as being, you know, a really good answer to the sustainability challenge. So for me, it's not a superstar, it's not a politician, it's more the local voice. When the local voice comes through, I think that would be a great. A great, you know, a great advocate and a great spokesperson. Nice one. Okay, we're coming towards the end of the podcast now Ciaran, is there any question I did not ask that you wish I did or aspect of this we haven't touched on that you think it's important for people to think about? No, you've asked them, We, we've touched on them. Absolutely, we've touched on touched on them. I think that you know, the data center industry and the technology industry at large, and we're, you know, we're seeing it now with what AI can do for medicine, what it can do for agriculture, We're, you know, we're we're, we're very much at the the beginning of a kind of a new era of accelerated computing, bringing accelerated benefit to society at large. And, And I suppose we get into the philosophical debates and you made the point about chips designing chips. I remember years ago being in a, in a factory where robots were manufacturing robots, which kind of freaked me out as well. You know, I think the optimism is important, and I think that, as a society we're on this technology journey, we've been on it for 30 years, we're gonna be on it for forever more. And embracing what technology can do for us is really, really important. And I think for me as somebody who's in the industry, that's what I try to advocate for. So we covered the topic, but yeah, optimism and and curiosity will define the future for us. Fantastic. Okay, Ciaran . if people would like to know more about yourself or any of the things we discussed in the podcast today, where would you have me direct them? Well, you can hit me up on LinkedIn Ciaran Flanagan. Ciaran, Flanagan, all one word on LinkedIn. And then obviously siemens.com data center. You'll find everything we do for data centers and data center customers. Great, I'll put those links in the show notes as well. So everyone has access to them. Ciaran, that's been fascinating. Thanks a million for coming on the podcast today. Thank you, Tom. It was a pleasure. It really was a real pleasure. Thank you. Okay, we've come to the end of the show. Thanks everyone for listening. If you'd like to know more about the Climate Confident podcast, feel free to drop me an email to tomraftery at outlook. com or message me on LinkedIn or Twitter. If you like the show, please don't forget to click follow on it in your podcast application of choice to get new episodes as soon as they're published. Also, please don't forget to rate and review the podcast. It really does help new people to find the show. Thanks. Catch you all next time.