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• Workshop series: Making EU data centres more sustainable

How can EU data centres in the European Union be made more energy efficient and sustainable?

The European Commission’s Directorate-General for Energy (DG ENER) has commissioned a study with the aim of improving the assessment of the energy efficiency of data centres. At the same time, additional measures are to be developed to support the establishment of an EU-wide assessment system for the sustainability of data centres.

Objectives of the study:

• To record and assess the sustainability of data centres in the EU
• Analysis of existing reporting standards on the environmental impact of data centres
• Develop measures to increase energy efficiency and promote renewable energies
• Investigate the feasibility of a “net zero” data centre sector
• Providing recommendations for EU policy action

The study is based on an analysis of data from the Energy Efficiency Directive (EED) reporting on data centres in Europe. In addition, further insights into the sustainability and development of data centres in the EU are gained through extensive surveys, interviews with experts and operators and the evaluation of existing publications. It will also examine how well current regulations work and whether and how they can be optimised.

Stakeholder engagement

As part of the consultation activities for this study, we conducted a series of workshops aimed at engaging a diverse group of participants from the data centres community.

The stakeholder process ends with the fourth workshop. Feedback in text form (e-mail/pdf) can still be received until 15 July 2025 at eudcear@be.ey.com