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We use water in our restrooms and kitchens, and for cooling our buildings and datacenters. We began a water-saving program in fiscal 2008 and are developing a more formal water management plan. In the meantime, we've introduced site-specific water-conservation measures, such as automatic flush toilets, at several locations.
Nonchemical Water Treatment for Cooling
Datacenters typically use large amounts of chemically treated water for cooling. In fiscal 2008, we installed new systems that use electromagnetic rather than chemical treatment at our Menlo Park, California, and Broomfield, Colorado, campuses. The benefits of this new treatment technology are:
- Reduced environmental impact – no chemicals are released when water is replenished
- Reduced health and safety implications – no need to store or handle chemicals
- Improved performance – because the water is cleaner, the system runs more efficiently and requires less maintenance
- Less water use – cleaner water needs less replenishing
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These electromagnetic systems are several times more expensive to buy than traditional cooling, but they are significantly cheaper to operate. The system installed in Menlo Park is exceeding our expectations, and we estimate the payback period to be seven months. We plan to fit similar systems in another building in Broomfield in 2008 and in Santa Clara, California, in 2009.
The system being planned for the Santa Clara campus is expected to reduce water consumption from 20 million gallons per year to just under 16 million. The water and sewer savings translate into more than $125,000 per year. Similar savings are being realized in Menlo Park, and we anticipate the same kind of results with the new Broomfield system.
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