DIGITAL INSIGHTS: What's Your Data Center Footprint?

How much data center space does your digital life occupy? How much does your digital use tax the electric grid? And how would your policy choices affect both? A simple app lets you know. Try it!

By Martin Davis and Rose Maddox

Editor’s Note — If you want to skip the explanation that follows and go straight to the app that lets you measure the real cost of your digital life, click here. The app works best on a laptop or desktop.

“I don’t like data centers,” a friend of mine once said. “What do they even do?” A lengthy discussion followed, during which time my friend responded to their Apple watch at least a half-dozen times, both our phones were out googling information, and inside the coffee shop where we were sitting person and person paid for their coffee with their phone apps and received emailed receipts.

The discussion didn’t much help this person to better understand the role data centers play in day-to-day lives. Pointing out all the ways that data centers had touched our lives in that coffee shop, however, did.

But still, my friend was left wondering, how much of my digital life is wrapped up in data centers?

The answer lies not just in the digital tools we use, but the policy decisions we make about digital technology.

To help people better understand their digital footprint, the Advance turned to the Fredericksburg Regional Alliance and Rose Maddox, who crafted a three-step online tool that allows people to understand how much data center space is required to drive their lives.

Here’s how it works.

Build Your Digital Life

Ten common digitally connected household items are listed. Simply click how many of each you own.

See Your Footprint

From your answers, you’ll discover the amount of data center square footage required to run your digital life, as well as the total energy use required (including cooling). Finally, you’ll see your digital life’s impact on the energy grid.

Choose Your Policy Trade-offs

The app then presents five common policy options that affect how an individual’s digital impact shrinks or grows. Choose the ones you support, and see how it impacts your digital footprint

Is Your Digital Footprint More or Less Than the Editor’s?

Based on the technology that the Advance’s editor owns — Here’s how much space his devices take up each year in a data center, and the energy these devices require:

And here’s my impact on the grid.

Rejecting each of the five policy recommendations available, here’s the take-away from my digital footprint.

Choosing three policy options (Requiring data centers to run on 100% renewable energy, banning data centers near neighborhoods and parks, and requiring data centers to build their own roads and power lines) changes my profile markedly.

How do you compare?

Bridge the Gap

Data centers are growing because our lives depend upon them. Knowing how much our individual digital habits require of data centers, and how our policy choices affect our personal costs, is an important first step in balancing our digital lives and the infrastructure required to run them.

Martin Davis is Editor-in-Chief of the Fredericksburg Advance. Rose Maddox is the Business Development Manager at the Fredericksburg Regional Alliance.

Digital Insights is a weekly feature usually appearing on Thursdays that explores the role of data centers in our region. These columns will focus on four areas: tracking the development of data centers in our area, exploring projected and actual tax revenue trends, explaining what data centers are and how they affect our daily lives, and reporting on research and emerging trends in the industry. These columns are made possible, in part, by a grant from Stack Infrastructure.

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This article is published under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND. It can be distributed for noncommercial purposes and must include the following: “Published with permission by FXBG Advance.”