In its latest sustainability report, Microsoft revealed that it has started powering direct air capture (DAC) technology with waste heat from its data centers.
The pilot system, named DACinDC, has been integrated directly into the infrastructure of the tech corporation’s existing data centers.
There, it gets powered by waste heat generated from computing workloads, optimizing the DAC performance and efficiency via materials developed with the help of AI.
As Microsoft explains, this approach not only enables effectiveness improvements for the DAC technology, but it also provides a pathway for addressing the CO2 footprint of AI workloads.
The company points out that this is a more practical application of waste heat than conventional scenarios, which require for the heat consumer to be located physically near the source, imposing economic, geographical, and seasonal challenges.
To create this innovative DACinDC, Microsoft embarked on both internal and external research, collaborating with leading companies and research institutions to evaluate the feasibility and scalability of these decarbonization systems.
In 2024, the company managed to mature advanced customized solutions to the prototype stage, and going forward, it will explore other opportunities for utilizing waste heat, airflow, and water from data centers.
During that same year, Microsoft made headlines by sharing that its carbon emissions were up by 30% compared to 2020 levels, and the construction of data centers was labeled as the main culprit for the surge.
Relevant: Microsoft Purchases Over A Million Tons Of CO2 Credits From Hafslund Celsio
By implementing DACinDC, the tech company seems to be taking steps in the right direction to effectively address this issue, and it has also announced that it intends to work with suppliers that use 100% carbon-free electricity by 2030 as an additional effort to tackle its CO2 footprint.
Acknowledging the importance of carbon removal in the fight against global warming, Microsoft has also emerged as the leading buyer of carbon removal credits as a way to stimulate the rapid development of this sector and meet global climate targets on time.
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