The rise of digital media has drastically reduced the costs for retailers of storing and shipping their products. But even when the products are entirely digital (e.g. music tracks that can be downloaded from iTunes), there are still some costs – for instance, the cost of storing data. Search the Web to find some information that gives a rough idea of the cost of data centres in terms of energy and money.
Power consumption accounts for ~ 10% of the total cost of ownership of a data centre, and the yearly cost of power is expected to exceed the initial capital investment by 2012. In 2006, the per-annum cost of power for a data centre was £5.3 million ( Colin Barker [ 2006 ] ). And was projected to double to 11 million by 2011. Working with the assumption that these figures represent the 10% of the running cost, then:
- Data centre running costs circa 2006 ~ £53,000,000
- Data centre running costs circa 2011 ~ £110,000,000
( Projected values based from those found in Colin Barker [ 2006 ] ).
References:
Barker, C. ( 2006 ) Data Centre Energy Crisis Looms, ZDNet.co.uk, 25 October, [ online ], http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/systems-management/2006/10/25/data-centre-energy-crisis-looms-39284324/ ( accessed 27 Dec 2001 ).
