‘What Happens When Facebook Heats Your Home’

Morgan Meaker, writing for Wired:

Søren Freiesleben has lived in Odense his entire life. He likes the historic Danish city for its size. It’s not too big — just 200,000 people live there — and he never feels like he’s drowning in crowds. So far so normal. But there is something unusual about Odense: Its homes are heated by the social giant Meta.

Since 2020, Meta’s hyperscale data center — spanning 50,000 square meters on an industrial estate on the edge of the city — has been pushing warm air generated by its servers into the district heating network under Odense. That heat is then dispersed through 100,000 households hooked up to the system, with Meta providing enough heat to cover roughly 11,000.

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade; when massive data centers generate heat, warm houses.

(Also via Dave Pell.)

★ Wednesday, 20 December 2023