en.Wedoany.com Reported - Equinix and Italian energy company A2A have announced a joint waste heat recovery project. Located at the data center campus in Settimo Milanese, the recovered waste heat will be fed into Milan's district heating network. Under the specific division of labor, Equinix is responsible for the design and operation of the heat recovery system, while A2A will deploy four large-scale heat pumps with a total capacity of 72 MW, along with thermal storage facilities and new infrastructure, to transport the recovered thermal energy to various parts of the city.

Once fully operational, the project is expected to recover approximately 225 GWh of waste heat from the data center annually. This volume will increase the heating capacity of A2A's Milan district heating network by about 20%. According to estimates, the recovered energy could heat over 21,000 households and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by more than 345,000 tons. Equinix stated that this will be one of the largest data center waste heat reuse projects in Europe outside of the Nordic region. A2A noted that this collaboration aligns with its strategic direction of integrating energy, infrastructure, and innovation.

A study published in the Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews indicates that global data centers generate approximately 70 to 170 TWh of waste heat annually, of which an estimated 35 to 85 TWh is considered recoverable—roughly equivalent to Singapore's annual electricity consumption.

Waste heat reuse is gaining more attention in Europe. Similar projects are already operational in Sweden and Finland, while Germany has introduced regulations requiring data centers to provide excess heat to local district heating networks where technically feasible.