[Starlink] [E-impact] DataCenters in Space (was Re: fiber IXPs in space)

Thu Apr 20 07:10:27 EDT 2023

The article about the ASCEND project says:
"Very low ambient temperatures in space will dramatically reduce the need
for cooling equipment that consumes enormous amounts of energy. A
significant part of a data center’s energy use is for cooling equipment,
accounting for more than 50% in some facilities. Temperatures can be as low
as -292°F (-180°C) when an orbiting object is in the Earth’s shadow."

Hesham

On Wed, Apr 19, 2023, 10:44 PM Daniel Schien <Daniel.Schien at bristol.ac.uk>
wrote:

> I assume any object in orbit will be hidden from the sun some of the time.
> So, the machines will require some pretty big battery to go up with them.
>
> I'd like to also know what the launch cost is.
>
> Tom Segert estimates in his LinkedIn post, for a 100kg satellite payload:
>
> "TL:DR ~57 ton CO2e for a typical ESA satellite (including Ariane 6
> launch), <15t CO2e for a satellite built in a factory and launched with a
> re-usable rocket."
>
> Depending on the type of server that should go up there, this is a fair
> amount of carbon to offset from brighter sunlight.
>
> The article also gets the carbon footprint wrong:
>
> "Data centers are big energy consumers – between 2% and 3% of all global
> consumption – a rate that is doubling every year."
>
> The latest was IEA estimating it to be around 220-320 TWh (out of 30,000)
> in 2021 data and growing between 10-60% over 6 years in total (so let's
> than 10 CAGR). But it's certainly not doubling every year. That's just
> completely wrong.
>
>
> Daniel Schien
>
> Senior Lecturer in Computer Science
>
> Department of Computer Science | University of Bristol
>
> *Submit software engineering project ideas for 2022*
>
> bris.ac.uk/software-engineering
> Watch: https://youtu.be/lU-ZsBDFWDI
>
> Merchant Venturers Building , Woodland Rd Bristol, BS8 1UB
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> ------------------------------
> *From:* E-impact <e-impact-bounces at ietf.org> on behalf of Vint Cerf <vint=
> 40google.com at dmarc.ietf.org>
> *Sent:* Thursday, April 20, 2023 2:16:38 AM
> *To:* tom at evslin.com <tom at evslin.com>
> *Cc:* Michael Richardson <mcr at sandelman.ca>; starlink <
> starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net>; e-impact at ietf.org <e-impact at ietf.org>
> *Subject:* Re: [E-impact] [Starlink] DataCenters in Space (was Re: fiber
> IXPs in space)
>
> O&M will be a bear
> v
>
>
> On Wed, Apr 19, 2023 at 9:13 PM Tom Evslin via Starlink <
> starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:
>
> I think space-based data centers will be the rule rather than the
> exception. Wrote about that a couple of years ago although, as usual,
> things have not happened as quickly as I predicted
> https://blog.tomevslin.com/2021/07/computing-clouds-in-orbit-a-possible-roadmap.html
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Starlink <starlink-bounces at lists.bufferbloat.net> On Behalf Of
> Michael Richardson via Starlink
> Sent: Wednesday, April 19, 2023 7:35 PM
> To: starlink <starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net>; e-impact at ietf.org
> Subject: [Starlink] DataCenters in Space (was Re: fiber IXPs in space)
>
>
> I saw this reported in BIS-Spaceflight.
> (I'm usually a few months behind in reading it) I like the "first
> objective"!
>
>
> https://www.thalesgroup.com/en/worldwide/space/press-release/ascend-thales-alenia-space-lead-european-feasibility-study-data
>
> Cannes, November 14, 2022 – Thales Alenia Space, the joint company between
> Thales (67%) and Leonardo (33%), has been chosen by the European Commission
> to lead the ASCEND (Advanced Space Cloud for European Net zero emission and
> Data sovereignty) feasibility study for data centers in orbit, as part of
> Europe’s vast Horizon Europe research program.
>
> Digital technology’s expanding environmental footprint is becoming a major
> challenge: the burgeoning need for digitalization means that data centers
> in Europe and around the world are growing at an exponential pace, which in
> turn has a critical energy and environmental impact.
>
> The first objective of this study will be to assess if the carbon
> emissions from the production and launch of these space infrastructures
> will be significantly lower than the emissions generated by ground-based
> data centers, therefore contributing to the achievement of global carbon
> neutrality. The second objective will be to prove that it is possible to
> develop the required launch solution and to ensure the deployment and
> operability of these spaceborne data centers using robotic assistance
> technologies currently being developed in Europe, such as the EROSS IOD
> demonstrator.
>
> This project is expected to demonstrate to which extent space-based data
> centers would limit the energy and environmental impact of their ground
> counterparts, thus allowing major investments within the scope of Europe’s
> Green Deal, possibly justifying the development of a more climate-friendly,
> reusable heavy launch vehicle. Europe could thus regain its leadership in
> space transport and space logistics, as well as the assembly and operations
> of large infrastructures in orbit.
>
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>
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