M1 has a series of green data centre features which will be revealed closer to launch. With the Carbon Tax being a rather “hot” topic, we thought we’d open up a little. One key feature we can reveal is that M1 has always been designed to incorporate 2 tri-gen plants to support 100% of our mechanical (cooling) plant in the future. While the investment has not yet been confirmed, all the pipe work, BMS points, electrical and mechanical infrastructure has been designed and installed ready should we invest. A quick snap shot of where this infrastructure will sit in M1 is circled below:

These plants will not only generate low carbon emitting energy via gas turbine, but the heat normally rejected from the co-generation will be fed into an absorption chiller (see image below).

In Melbourne consuming a 1MW annually generates just over 10,500 tonnes of CO2. By using onsite co-gen (gas engine without heat recovery) 1MW annually would generate just under 4,900 tonnes of CO2. By using onsite tri-gen (gas engine with heat recovery) 1MW continuous consumption annually would generate approximately just over 2,600 tonnes of CO2. Now consider that our mechanical plant will consume up to 4MW of enegy and from this we can generate 12 MW of cooling capability (assuming COP of 3) at $23/tonne tri-gen is looking good once load reaches minimum levels required for installation and operation.