Equinix, a digital infrastructure company, opens its first co-innovation facility (CIF) at the Equinix Ashburn campus in the Washington, D.C. area. The company expects that CIF enables partners to work with Equinix on trialing and developing innovations.

An official release from Equinix stated that sustainable innovations, including liquid cooling, high-density cooling, intelligent power management, and on-site prime power generation, will be incubated in the CIF in partnership with leading data center technology innovators including Bloom Energy, Zutacore, Virtual Power Systems (VPS) and Natron.

Raouf Abdel, EVP, Global Operations at Equinix, commented, “the data center of the future must be sustainable. Equinix is committed to sustainability globally as evidenced by its target to be climate neutral across our business by 2030. We are well on our way with over 90% renewable energy coverage worldwide. And thanks to the work we’re doing with partners at the CIF, we’re continuing to make significant advancements in the way we design, build and operate our global platform, with high energy efficiency standards.”

Equinix offers the following to its partners from the facility:

Generator-less and UPS-less Data Centers (Bloom Energy): Utilizing on-site solid oxide fuel cells enables the data center to generate redundant cleaner energy on-grid and potentially eliminates the need for fossil fuel-powered generators and power-consuming Uninterrupted Power Supply (UPS) systems.

High-Density Liquid Cooling (ZutaCore): Highly efficient, direct-on-chip, waterless, two-phase liquid-cooled rack systems, capable of cooling upwards of 100 kW per rack in a light, compact design. Eliminates the risk of IT meltdown, minimizes use of scarce resources including energy, land, construction, and water, and dramatically shrinks the data center footprint.

Software-Defined Power (VPS) with cabinet-mounted Battery Energy Storage (Natron Energy): Cabinet power management and battery energy storage system manages power draw and minimizes power stranding to near zero percent, leading to a potential 30-50% improvement of power efficiency.