Zafrul: Guidelines on data centre power, water usage by 3Q

• Zafrul said Miti will work closely with MDEC to incorporate the improvements into the data centre ecosystem.

CYBERJAYA (Aug 6): The government will announce guidelines for data centre power usage effectiveness (PUE) and water usage effectiveness (WUE) by the third quarter of the year to boost investments.

Investment, Trade and Industry Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Abdul Aziz (pictured) said the guidelines would ensure data centres built in Malaysia meet the minimum sustainability requirements to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050.

“As data centres consume a lot of power and water, we want to ensure that the data centres built here (in Malaysia) meet the minimum requirements set by global institutions.

“Sirim and the Department of Standards Malaysia are in the midst of finalising (the guidelines), and we will announce them by the third quarter this year,” he told reporters after the groundbreaking ceremony for Vantage Data Centers’ second campus (KUL2) here Tuesday.

Zafrul said the Ministry of Investment, Trade and Industry Ministry (Miti) will work closely with the Digital Ministry and Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) to incorporate the improvements into the data centre ecosystem.

Meanwhile, Digital Minister Gobind Singh Deo, who was also present at the groundbreaking ceremony, said the two main challenges for data centre investments are power and water.

He said that the guidelines being developed will ensure that the country has a sufficient and sustainable supply of both resources for the next five to ten years to attract more investments.

Gobind said the Digital Ministry and Miti are working together to address concerns about sufficient water and electricity supply due to significant demand from industry players.

“We need to push ahead to ensure we can develop Malaysia as the hub for data centres in this region, particularly as we move towards the country’s Asean 2025 chairmanship.

“We want to project Malaysia as a country with clear policies that are attractive not just to data centres but all investments in that ecosystem as well,” he said.

Vantage’s KUL2 is located adjacent to its existing campus in Cyberjaya. It will have 10 facilities across 256,000 square metres.

The US$3 billion (RM13.3 billion) KUL2 data centre campus will deliver 256MW of information technology (IT) capacity to meet the growing demand for hyperscale data centre services.

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