It has become well known that massive data storage centers where much of the worlds images, videos, and documents are stored require massive amounts of energy.
New research sponsored by software giant Microsoft includes a promise from the company that it would help develop sustainable materials, including hemp, that store carbon to help construct data centers and other buildings.
The research, produced by the Carbon Leadership Forum at the University of Washington, gathers information from existing literature about early-stage, sustainable materials that are in development.
It showed that buildings could replace concrete with carbon-storing natural materials including mushrooms, algae, hemp, thatch and plain earth.
“These materials warrant realistic enthusiasm and are worthy of investment to aid and accelerate their prototyping, scaling, manufacturing, and marketable use in the building industry supply chain,” the report said.
Both Microsoft and Amazon invested in CarbonCure, a company that pumps CO2 into the concrete as it sets, but the process only compensates for 5% of the emissions created from a batch of concrete and can only be used in small portions of building projects, according to Data Center Dynamics, a London-based data industry trade publication.