China's Green Data Center Plans 45
itwbennett writes "It's no surprise that China's internet-using population is growing fast. And so it's also no surprise that the country is planning to build new data centers by the dozen. What is surprising, at least to those of us who expect to read stories about widespread pollution in China, is that China is working with both The Green Grid and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory to develop standards for energy performance."
Re:No mystery here. (Score:5, Insightful)
and it's not like china is opposed to clean energy, they're just cheap and corrupt, so at least one part of their society is trying, which is better than nothing.
FTFY (Score:4, Insightful)
Chinese are pragmatic (Score:5, Insightful)
Chinese are pragmatic, or at least the government.
They realize that if they will need to provide a future for 1.x billion people they need to do something about the local environment.
Climate change appears to be another matter on today's agenda. But, I'm sure that will change too. There are other large pollutors which will be more difficult to change, despite having a better general awareness.
Re:Not that suprising (Score:5, Insightful)
China is the largest investor in renewable energy of any country in the world.
China is also the largest provider of toxic adulterants in exports. They build factories where people are given 15-minute breaks twice a day to urinate and defecate, and four hours to sleep. Western companies make a show of trying to police these factories, but when it comes down to brass tacks, there are simply too many factories, too many bodies, and not enough oversight for any of it to make a lot of difference. The solution to factory suicides in China? Bars on the windows.
Because we're apparently now a nation that simply consumes things made elsewhere - mostly China, it seems at times - it's easiest to just trust them when it comes to things like baby formula (melamine), pet food (more melamine), drywall (formaldehyde and H2S), paint on toys (lead)....and when your relatives get sick because they can't breathe due to the toxic wallboard, well, there's no one to sue for recovery of lost money, time, and health. Oh, well!
The Chinese culture does not define trust the same way Western societies do. Most of their factories are owned by former military generals. The standards being developed will come with lots of access to LBNL's own methodologies, networks, people, and other trusted entities, which China will be happy to use for their own benefit.
Trust me on this.
surprising? (Score:4, Insightful)
For whom is that surprising?
China is huge - four to five times the population of the USA. Any attempt to clean up existing problems while at the same time realising record growth year-after-year is a mean task. So concentrating on making new things future-proof is the best approach. If you are good there, it may turn out that replacing the old, dirty stuff is better than modernizing it.
And the chinese government, for all the faults it has, is certainly one of the best governments in regards to long-term planning right now. Other than most of the career politicians in the west, they regularily look beyond the next election.