Research from consultancy Wood Mackenzie (WoodMac) finds that the base metals required to power the global data centre boom extend far beyond the servers, cooling units and enclosures inside these facilities.
The consultancy highlights, in a media release, that when grid reinforcement, transmission networks and facility-level power systems are included, total system-level metals consumption reaches an estimated three to four times the volume implied by the asset itself.
WoodMac’s research, titled ‘Data centre metals demand: it’s all about the infrastructure not internals’, sets out why the conventional framing of this demand story is incomplete and what that means for commodity markets, infrastructure investment and energy policy.
“Most assessments of data centre metals demand stop at the server room door,” says WoodMac senior research analyst, aluminium markets Shashank Sriram.
“That captures the smallest part of the picture. The infrastructure required to keep a modern data centre running, redundant power systems, on-site generation and transmission reinforcement, has a metals footprint that dwarfs what is happening inside the facility.
