DCD Zero Downtime: The Bi-Weekly Data Center Show

Episode 41 - Do data centers truly bring economic benefits to their location? With Max Schulze, SDIA

Sep 28, 2023

Max Schulze, Co-founder of SDIA, discusses the challenges of quantifying the economic benefits of data centers. They explore the positive impacts data centers have on local businesses, taxation issues faced by owners, and the need for a global organization in digital economics. The conversation highlights the absence of definitive conclusions regarding the economic impact and proposes a specialized economic model for the industry. It emphasizes the importance of considering non-monetary values when attracting data centers to municipalities.

31:21

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Episode guests

Max Schulze

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Quick takeaways

Determining the economic value of data centers requires comprehensive cost-benefit analysis that considers socialized costs and revenue generation challenges.

Differentiating between regional data centers and global infrastructure is crucial to understand the local advantages and strategic placement of data centers.

Deep dives

The Economic Value of Data Centers

Determining the economic value of data centers is a complex task. While it is easy to recognize the job creation and local material purchases during construction, understanding the revenue generation and tax implications once the data center is operational is challenging. Municipalities often see data centers as a positive development due to low traffic, noise, and pollution impact, along with property tax benefits. However, there is a lack of comprehensive cost-benefit analysis that considers the socialized costs of building grid infrastructure and water supply. Moreover, the challenge extends to global companies that structure themselves to optimize tax payments, making it unclear how to account for the revenue generated in a particular country.

Introduction

2min

Economic Benefits and Taxation Issues of Data Centers

6min

The Challenges of the Digital World

4min

The Need for a Global Organization in Digital Economics

14min

The need for a new economic model and consideration of values in data center location

2min

Exploring the Integration and Value Creation of Data Centers

3min

Data centers have outgrown their anonymity. They are large enough consumers of energy and space, that they have to enter the political landscape and justify their existence. But how do we know if a data really brings benefits to its location?

In some places (like London), it appears that they soak up grid connection capacity and block housing projects. In others (like Denmark and Ireland) they use renewable energy and jeopardize local decarbonization targets.

It's not easy to know the net benefits brought by a data center, because much of what it does is in the virtual world, and is delivered to people far away.

Max Schulze has some thoughts on how to start working out the real benefits of a data center - and we hope for more input from DCD readers and listeners.

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DCD Zero Downtime: The Bi-Weekly Data Center Show

Episode 41 - Do data centers truly bring economic benefits to their location? With Max Schulze, SDIA

Episode guests

Podcast summary created with Snipd AI

Quick takeaways

Deep dives

The Economic Value of Data Centers

Regional Data Centers and Global Infrastructure

The Need for New Economic Models and Global Collaboration

Remember Everything You Learn from Podcasts