Ep9: Sustainable AI Data Centers for a Carbon-Free Future

This is uptime now, a Norton Rose Fulbright podcast dedicated to conversations about data centers. From development and construction to cutting-edge technology and operational breakthroughs and the people driving it all. Joining us today is Susanna Cass, Senior Data Center Advisor to UNSTG, Operating Partner of Digital Gravity Infrastructure Partners, Senior Advisor for AI Data Centers at Stulls, Co-Founder of InfraPrime and a Senior Advisor to the Board of Caretis Group. She is a 2026 Global 100 Game Changer. She has ranked Top 5 Data Center Global Leader within video, AMD, AWS, and Digital Realty. A Top 5 MSN Most Inspiring Leader, Top 10 Data Center Women in Data Centers, Top 10 Sustainability Leader, a Top 10 Data Center linked in Data Center Influencer, and a Climate Change Trailblazer for over two decades. And to top it all off, she is an Amazon Best Seller author on Sustainability and Responsible Growth for Data Centers in the AI Era. Susanna, welcome to the show. Thank you, Samir. Thank you so much for having me today. It is absolutely a pleasure. It's great to have you, you know, saying all those things about you, which are all true. I imagine I'm just thinking about the amount of time and effort it goes into doing these things, great things that you've done, where do you find free time? My free time is actually inside a data center. That makes sense. Yes. Well, you spent more than three decades in the pursuit of climate positive results for planet, people, and profit, and the tech and data center sectors. Why is this climate and sustainability piece important to you? And can we support all the massive data center growth we're seeing unfold around the world in a sustainable way? Well, first of all, I want to thank you, Samir, today, and actually all your colleagues putting together this wonderful platform. So you can actually amplify a lot of the work that many leaders in this space have worked really hard for. So personally, for me, Samir, throughout my journey as a data center innovator, I have fought for what I believe in and what the UN SDG sustainable development goes environmental programs stands for, which is a carbon-free future in not just a next generation, but in our current generation is a paramount importance. As the planet itself is actually quite resilient, humans are actually the one that are ignoring the consequences of our own actions to pursue growth in our own way by rapidly depleting this natural ecosystems in a linear economy model, which means we grab the resources, we use them and we toss out what we don't need. Well, that is not sustainable in any imagination. Authentic leadership that we are in our role today must act now with ethical values more than just our own needs to serve as a P&L statement because there's a social cost of ownership. So in the use of technology advancement, which is the joy that I have and this platform I have for all the, you say, the work that I do, but if you actually having fun, I don't actually see that as work, which is creating clean energy generation, being an inventor, and also this cannot be more an opportunity for your platform to amplify the key message because it is with the growth of AI, which I'm sure we're probably going to go into it later, we can harness the new value creation without official intelligence, just like this week at Nvidia GTC 26 in San Jose, 30,000 of us gathered together to celebrate, to discuss the transition of AI using the technology towards myself in clean energy and carbon free economy. But it's more than just the energy resources to me, it's really relating to grid modernization to pave the way for future generations of people that come behind us and we don't even know them today, but the impact of our work will lead ways to make each moment accountable for what comes behind us and have yet to actually dream of what they're going to be doing. So we need to ensure they always have the choices, they also have the choices that we can make today and we should not do anything that basically eliminated those choices, especially the precious mineral. So for our industry, the way forward is very clear and that's why I'm actually committed in just talking. Yeah, tell us a little bit about absolute zero and how it differs from net zero, because I think most people are familiar with net zero and think about net zero, at least in the industry that I'm in and the work that we do in terms of offsets and the like, I don't think as many people are aware of what absolute zero means. Of course, of course. So let me give a little bit backdrop for your audience for some of them will not be even familiar with why we even care to actually have this accounting and metrics. So in the data center world, which you may think is foreign, but you shouldn't be because anytime that we're actually listening to a podcast, recording a podcast or we play with educate, we entertain, or we actually do things using government services and whatnot. We are interacting with a data center in some way shape or form because you either using the compute, you're using the data storage and you being authenticated somehow and all of that is actually utilizing either the internet or a high speed connectivity or some kind of transport medium. So all of that only makes sense can be happening and we realize that when it didn't happen, which is around energy, you notice, like, oh my god, what happened? You know, when I have a power failure and something is not working, you're not working because it's not fast enough for you or it's just basically a blackout. Okay. So power is critical to all aspects of the data center. So the answer to your question, Samia, is the following. So I would say about a year and a half, a decade and a half ago, we start doing the accounting at the end of the year. So we say, okay, what have we used per annum in terms of this resources called energy? And then later on, we track other resources such as water and so on. But let's focus on energy. So next year, oh, it's an accounting method on saying that, hey, I have used that much unit of energy for my entire year in my data center and also in the use of building because most of our hyperscator have, I would say, 90% of the energy consumption is in data center and the remaining of it all, which is pretty important because we have, you know, big use of building headquartered in supply, manufacturing sites and whatnot. But effectively, they're like rounding errors. Okay. So we each of them account for the total consumption of energy. And when they present the report, they say, aha, using your term, I offset it by buying that much new energy, hence it created a market for renewable energy, power purchase agreement. And so it is an accounting offset and hence the word net zero. But what I felt is important is a following. I felt that we need to be more bold. We need to take more action and we need to raise our ambition in the standard. So doing an offset is not good enough. It's not like, hey, I want to be healthy some year. But I'm only going to work out six hours every day for three months. Well, what about the rest of the other time period, right? It's on that part. So I felt it is more important to come up with a new design called absolute zero where we should be measuring how often we work out. We should be measuring hour by hour consumption for each of the data center by application. Okay. And we not just do the offset, but we genuinely provide on premise clean energy generation. So we are using the clean energy hour by hour instead of doing whatever the heck that we still do all habits and then we just do the offset. So that's the primary difference between net zero, which is very important. Don't get me wrong. It's great to have a baseline and account for the net zero and a corporate report. But it's actually more important to make the happens to get into the habits of doing what is right in the first place, which is per kilowatt per energy hour by hour. We are going to basically use energy and then we measure the greenhouse gas reduction by tonnage, but not wait till the end of the year. This is a relatively new thought. You've led, you know, four plus kilowatts of data center and clean energy projects around the globe, 20 countries or so from your vantage point, are there certain countries that have figured it out and that are easier to build from a sustainability perspective or that of, you know, are thinking more about absolute zero versus net zero. Well, very good question. I learned a lot by actually visiting the actual size around a country, right? I would say absolutely yes. What started to be a renewable energy, power, participant effort has turned out into be more meeting with people that is basically the lifestyle. So they're not just by doing contractual revenue, contractual offset. I would give a few examples and most of them actually is in the countries that are so surprised to you or the audience, the Nordic countries have the backdrop of the hydro, right? So therefore is a lot easier for them because they have a lot of export, they have been getting in a habit of exporting the access clean energy anyway because of the wonderful location that they actually have in terms of the hydro. Sweden is a country, however, is very small. country, but it's been committed to circular economy to basically do reused recycle, regenerate from heatways and using clean energy. So as more habitual country that has the support of the prime minister, the king and the queen in terms of, hey, we as a country need to embrace that as a lifestyle. So sincerely it's actually very helpful. They don't actually don't even have the three color bins that any of the countries have, because it's just kind of part of the lifestyle. You actually doing that, you're already doing it, right? Okay. So I would say the US is one country under the current administration that has withdrawn from the commitment, from the Paris agreement. So that's, you know, world news. And there is an index, which is global, called environmental performance index, EPI, and it basically measured the environmental health, such as air quality, sanitation of drinking water, ecosystem vitality, such as biodiversity, what are the habitat of the special species that need to be protected. So we don't have extinction for a station, for example, efforts and specifically climate change mitigation for some of the gas that has been identified for them, specifically, well known, of course, is cop and down size CO2 or CH4 or N2O. Basically, those are the gas that are harmful to the environment, even to the human or any living beings for that matter. So I would say follow good science. US unfortunately is a country that I love a lot that is leading in data-centered deployment that has dropped out of the top 10 similar of the EPI index. And at the moment right now is kind of in a free fall in a ranking perspective across all categories that I just mentioned. So I think it's really important that we, it's never too late to make a change, it's never too late to embrace something that you think is the right thing to do. So I would say, you know, let's not do a rowback, let's follow good science, and it's never too late to actually make a contribution towards the environmental health. After all, we may actually created the country from a boundary perspective. Those are all artificial, you know, because if you look at it from, from afar onto earth, there's no boundary. We live in one world. Right. Yeah. I talk about it outside of the context of the environmental world, just, you know, in the context of like your, like your, your physical self, you know, with our, with our colleagues here who, who worked very hard and, you know, just talking about how important it is to focus as well on your, on your personal and physical health so that you can do this for the long run. And it's like the exact same thing with the earth, you, you have to, you have to think about the, the wellbeing of the earth, because it's all we have. I'm curious. I definitely want to talk to you about the role of the circular economy, a connection with the data center world and, and the five pillars to carbon neutrality. But before we go there, you've worked with so many of the top tech and energy and infrastructure companies out there, including eBay, HP, send microsystems, and Oracle, next era, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, but this kind of goes on and on. I'm curious, like what's been one of your favorite or most memorable, memorable projects and why? Well, most memorable, yes, Samir. Favorite? No. As a mother of two daughters, myself, I love each of my children equally and differently, because each is unique, you know, and data centers like snowflakes. They all seem to look alike, but when you look closer, each of them are really differently, and you really need to design, build, and nurture them, just like we do without children, and you need to communicate with them, support them, and do things differently because we are the parent. So my clients are the same way. They're all unique in their own demands, in a data center, including the design, where we put the sites, the operational discipline, the service level agreement, because it each have its own ecosystem, because of the location of this physicality, but at the same time, we all work together and they all link together in a digital fabric. So in a way, it really doesn't matter what the location is. I'm going to ask you a question. However, I'm going to go answer a question. My favorite data center is the one that I don't need to build. Okay. The cleanest data center is not the one powered by renewable energy or clean energy. My favorite one is section to one that we don't need to build, because it is the cleanest project, because there's no company mission, no intensity in terms of using bad resources, and I am not depleting any environmental resources. And the reason why I actually set that is actually not synthetic or virtual, it is actually real. Data centers are often built with over-professioning of resources. And so we have a lot of capital, so we will use abundant resources and leave them in an idle state. Now, it's not like we're not efficient driven. Data centers are very efficient driven. However, the metrics of the data center is still today for all the three decades plus that I get involved in it and what I learned when I was before I even joined a sector is measured by uptime performance. So we will take a lot of more resources. We call them proficienting. We will have all the resources that link to the data center in the event that may be a great failure in the event of a catastrophic events. And we still need to make sure that we maintain them, because we wanted to avoid making the headline news, so to speak, that there's some outage. You get it, right? So in order for us to do that, the over-professioning is not so much as we grab the resources because we can. It's because they become backup assets. And they oftentimes stand idle just to support those 0.001 percent incident that will happen because we have no idea when that's going to happen and they're never used in the operation. So my favorite you can kind of tell is the one that I don't need to build, but what I can do is I can squeeze productivity and utilization by harnessing these resources by perhaps designing a data center that has some recovery failover algorithm that is driven by AI technology or the grid outage mechanism because we kind of know. And you get it now, right? On how we actually be able to do so, by squeezing all the one that we already built instead of actually just keep doing the backup resources and letting them be idle, you know, it just doesn't feel right to you, right? It's kind of a waste of resources because those resources can be used immediately for other folks. And we can still achieve the uptime performance. So these resources are not wasted in the lifetime as idle. So hence the design of what we've done is actually we launched one with a hyper scaler in London of 90 megawatt with zero what we call generator. So it was fantastic to launch this year to share that in the middle of London, which is very valuable resources. And we got standing ovation and cheer that we are ambitious enough and we actually deploy them. What we have done is we still practice the backup, the recovery, except we use the grid to do it rather than our own resources because we can pay for it. So that's a good example in that regard. So I have a favorite design, but I'm not sure if I have a favorite data center is the principle of it all that is favorite that we can still achieve what we're supposed to do in this time uptime performance and resiliency, but we don't need to be, we need to be more capital efficient and we need to advance humanity and environmental resources. Yeah, you mentioned that that project in particular receives its backup power from the grid. Here in the US, we have a lot of issues interconnecting to the grid and long cues. And as a result of that, we're seeing a shift to where data centers are going out there and looking for huge behind the meter power plants. And then back up, you know, behind those power plants, do you think that the solution here is to create legislation or find ways of fixing the issues with the interconnection queue and the allowing projects to be able to tap into the grid? Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. I'm going to give a shout out to one of my clients and I learn a lot from them when we're collaborating on that, right? That's Google. So Google has made the announcement just this week, has integrated over one gig of what of energy contracts through what utilities call it demand response. So for those in the audience, what it basically man is the following, the grid load are oftentimes text in a hot day, okay? Because everybody kind of like, well, you know, it's kind of hot. I'm going to go turn on some devices, okay? And use more energy so you can provide cool air for yourself. So, and the data center is like here coming along. I'm going to use gigawatts and megawatts at the same time. Well, you know, not everybody need to watch a movie in a hot day by turning on all 11 channels when you actually, I'm not really watching them at the same time anyway, okay? So there are things that we can do, actions we can do in terms of curtailing. And so I hear for Google, for the announcement this week that they have done to show that over the time, the last decade, they have been successfully integrating with multiple utility to read. used energy demand from their own data center during certain hours of the day or time at the year to actually help balance the system low. I think that's a really good example. So, I mean, it's constrained in NOVA, it's constrained in PGM, it's constrained in Cal Isle or even in a free market like the IRCOT, right? And for just to put it in context because Amir, you probably know I'm a quantitative gal, I'd like to measure everything that we do or else to go as meaningless if it is not has a unit of measure and you won't be able to be transparent to talk about it so you can do the comparison. So, your question is extremely important for a simple 0.5% of the year that we participate in it and data center can absolutely do that because we have all these other backup stuff, you know, to survive the 0.5% that we can actually abstain from using from the grid, it will unlock 100 gigawatt of large loads, okay? That new capacity that can be used for other utility clients such as residential, small commercial and industrial sectors or more importantly first response folks that really needed to have energy when they actually needed it on demand. So, you know, just the fact that we actually can streamline and orchestrate our own usage behavior because we have backup and backup, we can generally do actions to balance the grid. So to me, this is not a future thing, that's why I used to work now generation. We need to make the decision now, we need to take the action now in order to do that. So, the technology is here, the only limitation is actually human in terms of not having an open mindset and take that action. So, I encourage everyone, all your audience to have an open mindset and really use the technology and just do things that are really basic, be able to just curtail 0.5% and we're going to gain that scale. Yeah. Can you talk about the five pillars to carbon neutrality and the role of the circular economy? Absolutely. Thank you for asking the question. It's actually one of my favorites. So, mentioned a little bit earlier, the data center when it embraces more circularity thinking instead of a linear economy thinking, which is grabbing the resources using it and tossing it out in the industrial sector, create a lot of problems. So, if we start thinking about circularity, which I would explain in a second, we will be able to achieve carbon neutrality a lot faster and more effective. The first pillar is actually using clean energy and clean fuel. So, for data center, we did a math calculation on it and we're absolutely moving in that direction. 75% of all energy consumed by the hyperscaler. If we operate it on renewable energy and clean energy, effectively just achieving the carbon neutrality goal and maybe reach 100% by 2030 or 2040, the first pillar for us to get to a carbon free economy is to utilize and transition to clean energy and clean fuel. Okay. So, the what not to do is actually use dirty diesel generator. What's not to do is actually stay on the fossil fuel or co-based as a resource. Now, if you get into a location where the renewable energy is not possible, then you need to start thinking about one thing is how can I remove the greenhouse gas that come out from these other resources? Because at the end of the day, it's not the energy source and it's the evil. It's when you use clean energy and clean fuel, you don't have GHG. But if you, such as nuclear, but if you use the fossil fuel, you need to have a mitigation method for you to be able to capture it so you don't just expel it out in the air. You get it? Okay. The second pillar is energy and resource efficiency. I gave a couple examples about participant. Okay. Shifting things, orchestrating a different environment. So, we actually will achieve more de-effectiveness of how we use the power. So, there's metric called usage effectiveness of power, usage effectiveness for water, and you wanted to get as close to one as possible. So, if your data center tell you that my usage effectiveness of power is 1.0201.01 such as the case for meta and Google and Microsoft on the hyper scale, that would be much better than you look at a data center to come in as a 1.6 because you're a lot more efficient in that regard. And every point 5% I already mentioned is probably in this scale about 100 gigawatt. So, kind of like do the math, this is very important in terms of usage efficiency of the resources. The third pillar is, what I said a little bit earlier, if you have some cases in some location or some time that we're not in 2030 or 2040 yet and the grid is still not 100% green, we need to figure away how to capture, how to reuse the emission. So, the more that we actually can remove these gigatons of CO2 from the environment and be able to use it in wonderful agricultural sector because we do need actually, by the way, CO2 in a beverage industry. For example, that's why you kind of get the bubbles, right? Or in my case, I invented the system with a couple of my colleagues in Switzerland that we actually use CO2 as a medium carrier to carry the heat waste. So, instead of using water to carry the heat waste, turn the chill water into warm water so you can actually take a shower in your gym, we actually use the CO2 and we carry a lot more in terms of quantity of heat and a lot more efficient in that regard and then we basically create an underground system of an urban heat system in Sweden. So, you don't need to have the energy for some people want to actually have a heater. We basically reuse or regenerate from the heat waste that we got from the data center. So, the third pillar is, you know, how can you technology to capture and we use this emission in other sectors such as, you know, give the heat to the strawberry, give the heat to the fishing industry, keep the heat to the greenhouse instead of using the energy from the grid in order to heat things out. Does that make sense? Okay. The fourth pillar is a circling economy to reduce the waste from the site bill and the data center life cycle because we use a lot of resources in the construction and the last thing we want to do is to have a big landfill. So, the zero landfill is the goal for the fourth pillar because we are genuinely doing the reuse, regenerate and also eliminate in terms of the waste during the construction phases and throughout the data center life cycle. So, heat waste is what we actually are targeting to reduce and more importantly, we also want to remove the embodied carbon which actually happens in the materials that we basically use to have also a zero and a low carbon footprint. The last pillar is my favorite, is to eliminate the use of water completely in the build and the operator data center so we can actually reach a use effect of the soft water less than 0.05. So, almost we don't use the water. At the moment right now we have seen some interim solution which is quite good and Google just actually announced two projects they have in terms of water replenishment. Okay. Which is really important because in state like Arizona or New Mexico, water is extremely scarce in that regards, specifically with the sanitation of the drinking water whatnot. So, the fifth pillar is to eliminate the use of water at all and start thinking about water less data center and then we will replenish. We also do the offset replenishing. So, these are the five pillars in terms of reaching, practicing a circular economy concept away from linear and moving us towards a carbon free economy. So, my question about all this is how do you incentivize these hyper-scalers and data center developers to care about these things and to invest in these things? I mean, on the one hand we're seeing large operators like Microsoft and Google come out and say that they want to be energy partners rather than energy problems. They want to help produce a cost of electricity. You're seeing one announcement after another about, for example, Google's acquisition of a renewable energy developer. So, they're clearly doing some of this already on their own. Part of it is I'm sure in response to this growing like NIMBY or not in my backyard movement. But, you know, what are your thoughts on how we can incentivize these developers and hyper-scalers to incorporate everything that you're talking about with these five pillars? Yeah. So, it's a growth mindset. It's actually we are light-minded people in that regard. It's to all of us basically have a growth mindset that we bias towards action in a circularity thinking and we all get together to basically look at the issues or the problems as an evidence. framework. By actually having these three tools, a growth mindset, a circularity thinking with the light-minded people, and all of us are following good science and focus on evidence instead of just an opinion, an idea that people have, we would kind of like invite those people not to be in our meeting. Sincerely guide organizations and leaders in the pursuit of a circular thinking, not a linear growth thought, and not limited to just a quarter to quarter KPI goals. The impact of a lot of these reuse comes easy, Samia, for a trial or youth. Someone much younger than you, someone much much younger than me, and not to try to really teach in a doubt like how to use the bin, you know, and you see that some of them they stand in front of this color bin, and they have like no idea what the word compost means, okay? It's like, it's really like really, okay? But not to, not to, you know, make fun of anyone, it's not my goal is the thought of actually, I care about how the planet is or what life is 50 years from now. Come yeas here for younger generation folks, because that's when they actually peak. And for many of the leaders in their organization, they don't even, you know, it doesn't come easy for many of us because we may not be around, we probably won't be around, I guarantee you, I'm not around 50 years from today. And so with that, the thinking in our daily life, because of the fact that it's just not within our time frame. So my suggestion, be able to do change management and whatnot. I, you know, and a couple of us teach those classes in Stanford University, right? About change management. It's not, it is really focusing on the literacy and who might be, what might be the group that basically cost the momentum and be able to show the facts. So hiring a young talent with an innate ability to think and live sustainability is key in any groups. That's why I'm the fan and I'm the co-founder of Kapo talent and tech initiatives, including the UNU for AI Summit now, which we now have 1500 youths in there and no surprise. A lot of them are girls just to kind of balance out the other goal with the standard equality. I would say invite people to actually have more dialogue. We'll go from there. Importantly, actually, you know, with all these nice words aside, the brand of actually be able to do sustainable is extremely important. Okay. Because if light mind that you're going to attract light-minded customers, light-minded supplier. So for many of the companies who, you know, I don't want to list too many names because I don't want to get in trouble for not listing their names on your broadcast. But I would say majority of all the folks that basically in AI, majority of all the consumer devices company and whatnot, the brand of being sustainable, they care beyond their own quarter to quarter performance for the environment is extremely important to them. If nothing else, that is actually the goodwill multiplier you get when you're actually doing a corporate transaction, not necessarily just your revenue metrics. So, well, you know where you're going to focus, right? You actually, Samir, can move the world. All you have to do is actually have a stake long enough and you know where the lever is. And I would say sustainability, care about the environment, as a company you stand for. Those principles, it's extremely important because that's why you're going to attract innovators, you're going to attract customers, you're going to attract people who want to work for your company and be part of your ecosystem. And they will vote by not buying your product otherwise. Yeah, I will agree 100% with you on that. You know, we have clients who are, some of the very largest tech companies in the world who are building a lot of these data centers. And, you know, we've sat in on their internal meetings and summits. And it's very clear up and down the change. They absolutely care about the environment. It's a huge priority for them. And it's nice to see and it's nice to work to your point with people who have a similar mindset. I want to ask you to put on your operating partner of digital gravity infrastructure partners hat for a minute and tell us your perspective on 2026 capital trends of digital infrastructure investments. Yes, I can say it's excellent and the future look really bright. Especially, especially, you know, we're all kind of like brief the air of Nvidia ecosystem. So I always say seriously, if I'm a the capital trend perspective, the outlook for AI digital infrastructure and digital gravity is only one of the fun that I work in. There's other ones that I also support. The outlook is really good. From a pipeline perspective somewhere, we have no short capital and actually raising capital when we actually have these projects that build out, you know, DXS reference architecture design and the different AI factories. So we are not so much just going and grab the power because we can. We actually look for those opportunities that we can actually be a coach contributor because when we showed up, we can be an excellent anchor tenant. We can be an excellent off-ticker for a lot of new clean energy projects. So we speak not just loudly. We actually take action in terms of showing up as anchor tenant contract contractual revenue multi-year with credit worthiness credit that we earn for. Nice to have to have those multiple. So from a capital perspective, there's genuinely no short supply. Now, obviously, there's pruning going on and it is a competitive field because similar to energy storage, we all have seen, right? You know, the price have gone down and we are going to drive the efficiency. You know, we are going to drive the efficiency. You will stay profitable because you are adding value during creation and we will continue to actually drive the cost curve down for building the data center in a much shorter time frame and using less capital to do a lot more. So let me be specific. We are expecting the megawatt that we're actually going to build. Maybe, I don't know, just pick 40 to 60 is a good range. 40 to 60 megawatt where we're actually going to pay used to be is 46 megawatt. We are actually driving that efficiency in that regard. So, you know, stay alert for some of the people we're going to negotiate with you, but however, you're building 40 to 60 megawatt, you shouldn't be spending, you know, connects of what we used to build for four megawatt, right? Because there's a lot more efficient. So, we actually wanted to kind of see that reverse because by doing so, Samir, we make that to be affordable. We make it to be pervasive and that's how we actually try to push the innovation envelope be able to measure that. So, that's no distinction between just a sustainable data center, you know, just good for the environment. We want the cake and we want to eat it too, right? Meaning that we are building sustainable data center that is going to deliver enterprise revenue at the same time. It has to advance humanity. It has to advance protecting the environment and make it better. Yeah, I'm curious. How do you distinguish between investments that are sustainable and create, you know, this value and the contrast of that and just, you know, investments that create enterprise value. Like, how do you how do you think about it and your investment thesis? We look at that in terms of a value matrix that we actually created by location, okay? So, we input a lot of data in terms of what is available to us that a lot of the providers or vendors or partners information might be. And then we go back and we basically use our design, you know, I drive a lot of those discussion by saying that, hey, we are not a singular, we're not sequential. What we like to do is actually work backwards, right? So, I'll give you three example that we happen this week. We want to do an AI factory commercial transactions in days, not months. Not to say I want you to work late at night last night and you don't go to sleep so you give it to me in two days versus I give you six weeks to get back with me on a boat. No, not at all. What we have done is basically the preparation work timing. It takes longer and we basically do due diligence during your preparation work. When we start socializing with line-minded people, it's just a lot faster. When we genuinely have to trust with each other, we used to tool call speed of trust. So, you and I don't even, you and I will finish each other's sentence, so to speak, because we are line-minded in terms of what we have and you're going to help me to fill the gap and I'm going to help you to create value over your assets, right? So, so when it comes time to we sitting down to do the contractual signature, we already have vetted out the fuel at the financial efficiency. We already vetted out the resources, we already vetted out regulatory constraints and whatnot. So, we then be able to clearly transact in 48 hours because it doesn't take that long and it's all digital signature anyway, right? Okay, so the part on that one is good and another one varies. My favorite metric is basically call time to market and commissioning. When we can absolutely use the reference architecture that we actually also have announced this week in addition to the older version of the AI factory reference architecture. Well, actually every hyperscaler and when they do the cloud or even the enterprise data center that I support at Goldman Sachs and whatnot, we always have reference architecture. We, you know, you got to be kidding, right? We don't build everything one off and we don't do that. So there's templates, you know, similar to how you do the podcast just like, you know, instructions on actually how you supported it. There's like, empathize how you do that to be more efficient and you continue to improve your performance. It's the fact that we use the reference architecture, be able to freeze the code, freeze the design. So when you have the design freeze to commissioning, you know what are the key things you need to kind of get done, right? Okay. Then obviously there's some life things that you need to pivot because there's always some issues coming up and we're driving for 180 days and we're going to drive for 90 days in terms of being burning up for live production. So no more about be able to have a baby in nine months. Those days are gone. Okay. So we're going to be driving efficiency in that regard and let's see what else. And then the third one, I would say you think about it from a ecosystem. There's a lot of talk right now or at least this year or last year, a lot of people just kind of like freak out. It's like, oh my god, the AI systems are so dense, you know, they're megawatt per rack. And so you need to kind of like who those guys, you know, this and that the whole thing. And a lot of people came on and start talking about thermal management. Well, at the end of the day, what we actually trying to do is not to solve the cooling problem. Same here. What is the problem you think we're trying to solve? Remove the heat. You don't need an air conditioning if you actually don't feel heat in the first place, right? So those are some of the things that we really do. So it's like being a critical thinker is like not to solve problems faster. It's solve the problem. So that's actually really great to be able to work together on that when you talk to capital investments. It's not to pay, you know, attention to all issues, but identify what are the priority and the severity of the of the topics that we need to address. And then you go all the way, which is called integration in that regard. So what we're working on is a stack integration vertically, but we want to keep everything open as an open system, use open source for horizontal partnership. Yeah. And you're doing this work at a global scale. You have a very cool role as the senior data center advisor to the UN SDG, the sustainable development goals. Can you talk a little bit about what those are and what pathways are, what what the pathways are and which pathways are the most off track today? Yes. Well, that was actually changed. It actually turned out to be something that I have to say I sit in a meeting with Stanford professor, but he was actually just too busy to be able to do the mapping of the data center with the UN SDG goal. And I was at that time to see all for eBay international, right? And I say, hey, you know, the goals looked really great. They're all very pretty and whatnot, but we'll never use it. And I think I was then thrown into the ring, as by saying that, well, okay, why would you say you won't use it? And so I start identifying through the sigma, the six sigma method and being able to identify, okay, the UN SDG goal set all this. Well, we kind of say it this way. So it's more like a language diversification. So when I start mapping the language and the taxonomy by saying that, hey, we actually meant the same thing. Why don't we say it the same way? Then all of a sudden, we actually then very quickly be able to identify many of the innovation goals and whatnot. And I have an illustration for a white paper that I did that probably about I would say 15 years ago. And it still worked today. And I used that to discussing classes like what is innovation infrastructure mean? What is responsible generation mean? What is responsible consumption really mean? Right? Okay. So what I talked about a little bit early about, hey, don't use water if you don't need to. You know, don't waste resource. You don't need to. Well, that is responsible consumption, right? Okay. So as long as we actually start mapping those goals in our design, we were able to come up with carbon neutrality goals, we were able to actually come up with, you know, more extension of that like the CSI report and whatnot. And we just start mapping the elements in there. So in a way, I'm very proud that we all be able to say, you know, what we really meant in a common language, and we all understand each other, you know, when we in the same room or not even in the room, myself, when we felt like that way. So I think that was important to be able to unify that. The one that I would say the UNSDG goal that we most of track on specifically in the data center is the education of young talents and gender equality. We, we lack future generation leaders in the data center. The average age in our sector is 52 and a half. That is unacceptable. Okay. I'm not advocating that if you are all for that, you shouldn't be in a sector. Absolutely not. That is not what I meant. Okay. But there is something wrong in terms of the thinking, especially I mentioned a little bit earlier that it comes this year for the young generation to have the literacy of sustainability, and they don't even need to learn in the classroom. Actually, I tell into all of you in the audience, how did you actually start to recycle? Well, in my case, intellectually, I kind of understand, but it tick, it actually took my two young daughter who was doing a science project at seven and nine, that actually I sincerely start practicing recycling. I understand it, but why don't I do it? Why don't you add those to it? But from a young talent perspective, of course, you should recycle, mommy. So that's basically what I meant. So I would say invite a young talent in your group, invite a woman into your team. All of a sudden, if you genuinely have an open mind, we all would think very differently. And that's basically what is all about education for all everyone, every being in that regard. And that's basically what you and SVG stand for. And I really admire the leaders that put those goals in place, and we just need to embrace it and practice it. So I really think the off track is the education right now that we're not investing enough for the young talent. And I think we need to happen at all level, at the federal level, and also around your neighborhood. It's great. I mean, fantastic goal and appreciate all the work that you're doing on that front. And what I love about these goals is that it has the philosophy of having all of these countries move together at the same pace. And there are a lot of countries, obviously, they need a lot more help than others. And it's good to know that there are people out there thinking about these things and working on these problems, including you, of course. So you're someone that has a global reputation and a huge, you know, record of success over the last three decades as you think about the data center market and how it's going to evolve over the next five years. How do you think about where you're going to spend your time and create your impact? Yes, where I would like to spend my time is continue the journey because we have a little bit of a road back that I didn't kind of expect. Oftentimes, we'll also think for what movement, but we didn't, you know, it's a surprise that we didn't think about we're going to have a road back in our country. So I still think there's a lot of work right now, specifically the US in the clean energy transition and sustainability leadership. We're not going to give up. We're going to continue to focus our effort to work with climate experts, researchers at the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change in short is IPCC, who are worldwide experts who help influence the duration of effective climate environmental policy and economic model that can align to uplift the environmental protection index for, you know, basically globally, right? It really doesn't matter the countries. We just need to continue to actually have those sort of discussions. So I'm going to spend some time on that. Specifically, in the AI world, I will continue to actually contribute as a reference architecture designer and where it makes sense is to accelerate it through capital and talent. So I very much like to see a data center. Maybe some year, one day I will come back and say, "You know, I was wrong in answering this question. I do have a favorite." And the average age of building the entire data center is actually 23. Now, wouldn't that be delightful? And they're all women, okay? So, stay tuned. We are actually building some wood data center now that is using non-flammable materials. That has zero carbon. And we're already done the zero-dm. We're done the zero water. So I think we just need to show the world that it's actually possible. And people will enjoy to see the metrics because success breeds, you know, success as many fathers as with it this way. And it breeds ecosystem a lot each year. And it's wonderful to use many of these projects right now. And I have like gigawatts of pipeline of our project. And now we should continue to kind of demonstrate it. What I love to see is be able to come back to you. And when you can invite me back if it's helpful and say, "Hey, you know, you've done 4.8 over 33 years." And it hopefully do not take me another 33 years for me to double that number. And I am very committed that I think we need to basically make every gigawatt update AI factory to be sustainable, and that is actually happening. I think it's happening. It's happening in the location, which is not what I prefer, but it's actually happening. So I love this country. I love to see more of that, just in my backyard, right? - Hi to two, I'm with you. I hope we get there. I wanna thank you for your time today and the great conversation. Congratulations on all the incredible success and appreciate all the work that you're doing in the leadership on the sustainability and data center front, as well as the advocacy work that you're doing on behalf of women in this industry. Thank you so much for your time. - Thank you, thank you for having me. It's a pleasure. - Thank you for listening to Up Time Now. If this episode sparked an idea, pass it along to someone in New Network. You can leave a comment. I'd love to hear your thoughts, ideas, and recommendations for guests. Till next time, thank you and remember to subscribe. (upbeat music)