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PRESENTATION
Server Sky - Data Centers in Orbit
Power for computation on a Moore's Law schedule
Keith Lofstrom, http://server-sky.com
The EPA estimates US data centers (not including desktops)
consumed 1.5% of total US electrical consumption in 2006.
They predict a doubling to 3% of base load by 2011. Our
work as programmers and technologists continues this
runaway exponential growth, and we will be stopped by
environmental and resource limits soon.
Server sky is a proposal to use newly emerging solid state
technologies to build large arrays of 3 gram paper-thin
solar-powered computation satellites in 6400km Earth orbits.
A single server-sat replaces 15 watts of ground-based
electrical generation, cooling, and power conversion, as
well as the computation and communication hardware itself.
Orbital server farms may start out as expensive as current
approaches, but design improvement and cheaper launch will
decrease costs exponentially over time, much as transistor
cost has plummeted over the last four decades.
This is open technology, responsive to public input, and
the project needs volunteer software and engineering help
to stay that way. Eventually, Server Sky will create
thousands of open technology jobs in the Portland area,
and permit unbounded computation growth in space, while
reducing energy demand and environmental damage on Earth.
Earth can return to what it is good at green and growing
things while we fill space with gray and computing things.
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PRESENTATION
Server Sky - Data Centers in Orbit
Power for computation on a Moore's Law schedule
Keith Lofstrom, http://server-sky.com
The EPA estimates US data centers (not including desktops)
consumed 1.5% of total US electrical consumption in 2006.
They predict a doubling to 3% of base load by 2011. Our
work as programmers and technologists continues this
runaway exponential growth, and we will be stopped by
environmental and resource limits soon.
Server sky is a proposal to use newly emerging solid state
technologies to build large arrays of 3 gram paper-thin
solar-powered computation satellites in 6400km Earth orbits.
A single server-sat replaces 15 watts of ground-based
electrical generation, cooling, and power conversion, as
well as the computation and communication hardware itself.
Orbital server farms may start out as expensive as current
approaches, but design improvement and cheaper launch will
decrease costs exponentially over time, much as transistor
cost has plummeted over the last four decades.
This is open technology, responsive to public input, and
the project needs volunteer software and engineering help
to stay that way. Eventually, Server Sky will create
thousands of open technology jobs in the Portland area,
and permit unbounded computation growth in space, while
reducing energy demand and environmental damage on Earth.
Earth can return to what it is good at green and growing
things while we fill space with gray and computing things.
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