Design of Farm Waste-Driven Supply Side Infrastructure for Data Centers

Abstract

In this paper, we design a supply-side infrastructure for data centers that runs primarily on energy from digested farm waste. Although the information technology and livestock industries may seem completely disjoint, they have complementary characteristics that we exploit for mutual benefit. In particular, the farm waste fuels a combined heat and power system. The data center consumes the power, and its waste heat feeds back into the combined system. We propose a resource management system to manage the resource flows and effluents, and evaluate the direct and indirect economic benefits. As an example, we explain how a hypothetical farm of 10,000 dairy cows could fulfill the power requirements of a 1MW data center.