Martin Hetzner, founder of the web hosting company and cloud provider Hetzner Online GmbH, together with Joshua Tlapak, founder of MHB Montage GmbH, have formed a new company, HT clean energy GmbH. The new enterprise will focus on operating solar energy parks and large-scale battery storage operations. The first big project for the new company is a solar park in Nassau-Weikersheim in Germany. Work on this 7 hectare site has already begun. Once it is finished, it will generate approximately 6.5 MW of electricity and supply more than 1,800 households with green energy each year. And there are more projects already in the works. In the long term, the company wants to completely supply Hetzner’s data centers using energy generated by its own photovoltaic systems.
Data centers are the digital backbone of our globally interconnected world. They make it possible to visit websites, to process massive amounts of data, and to use countless digital applications in everyday life. As the demand for more computing power increases, so does the responsibility by providers like Hetzner to ensure that their power supply is reliable and uses sustainable energy. Therefore, Hetzner uses innovative solutions to save energy and resources in its data centers’ designs and operations. “Using modern cooling technology, we are able to cool our servers using outside air for up to 358 days a year, and by doing that, we save an impressive amount of energy”, explained company spokesperson Christian Fitz. “We have been using 100% hydroelectric power to supply our servers in Germany with electricity since 2008, and in Finland, we use also wind power.”
With the creation of the new company HT clean energy GmbH, Hetzner is taking another big step forward. “Our goal is to ensure that our data centers can meet growing energy capacity requirements, but that we can also do that by supplying them completely with self-generated, renewable energy. By doing this, we are taking responsibility to provide our clients with environmentally friendly IT infrastructure”, emphasized Martin Hetzner.
The new company symbolizes Hetzner’s efforts to actively shape the future of sustainable digitalization. By generating its own sustainable energy, the company will be taking an important step in becoming more independent in the long term, and, at the same time, will make an important contribution towards Germany’s efforts to transition to environmentally-friendly electricity sources. Moreover, this undertaking will serve as an example for how technological innovation and ecological responsibility can go hand in hand, and will help to set new standards for green IT.
