What if the energy crisis was the ultimate reason to migrate IT to the cloud?

While the cloud is the default option when it comes to launching a new project, some companies still have an on-premise infrastructure. That is, hosted on their premises and maintained by their own teams. Is this still a sensible choice in the current energy crisis? In addition to the cost of electricity, we now have to add the cost of upgrading equipment to comply with the French tertiary sector eco-energy decree.

The "tertiary sector decree" or the obligation to reduce your energy consumption

The Eco Efficacité Tertiaire (DEET) scheme resulting from decree no. 2019-771 of July 23, 2019 requires a gradual reduction in energy expenditure in tertiary buildings with a surface area greater than or equal to 1,000 m2. This obligation applies to both landlords and tenants. In concrete terms, companies must achieve a level of energy consumption corresponding to the standards applicable to new buildings, or else commit to a reduction in their energy consumption by choosing a reference year between 2010 and 2020 to target these successive stages:
- 40% by 2030
- 50% in 2040
- 60% in 2050

Several actions will be necessary to achieve this, from improving the energy performance of buildings. From changing individual user behavior, to replacing or shutting down the most energy-hungry equipment.

Against this backdrop, companies will necessarily have to consider modernizing their on-site computer rooms, with several options:

• Reuse waste heat to heat buildings,

• Renewal of the fleet in favor of more energy-efficient equipment...

These obligations also apply to datacenter operators, via the same tertiary decree. But also through the government's "digital and environment" plan, which reinforces the eco-conditionality of the reduced rate they benefit from on the domestic tax on final electricity consumption (TICFE). Although the datacenter industry is being asked to make efforts to reduce its energy consumption, it nevertheless seems to have a much easier time of it than companies. Since the datacenter operator's business consists precisely in pooling resources and industrializing processes, with the aim of achieving economies of scale and offering a better service at a lower cost than on-premise.

The Cloud to guarantee service continuity, even in the event of a power cut

The soaring price of electricity is putting a strain on company finances, without it being possible to pass on all the extra costs to customers. The risk of power cuts during peak winter consumption. A risk that authorities and companies are taking very seriously.

This is illustrated by the introduction of the EcoWatt "energy weather" prevention system, which encourages individuals and businesses to take eco-actions on orange and red days. These colors are synonymous with tension on the grid. This is to avoid the most extreme scenario. This involves load shedding, i.e. rotating power cuts lasting 2 hours to relieve the electricity network. This period is designed to preserve the cold chain in food stores. However, data center operators such as CIV are not subject to load shedding, or only under certain conditions. (The list of non-delestable sites is managed by the prefectures).
What if the worst were to happen? That is, if the network temporarily collapses, the datacenters still have 48 to 72 hours of autonomy via their thermal generators.

For your mission-critical applications, which would put your staff and/or customers out of work in the event of downtime, outsourcing via the cloud is more than ever recommended. Not to mention the difficulties in sourcing new servers, due to the shortages of electronic components that have persisted since the COVID crisis. The Cloud means you can deploy new VMs or obtain additional storage in just a few minutes.

Energy crisis: Cut computer room costs by a factor of 10

Maintaining your own computer room involves heavy investment and regular expenditure. Maintenance and renewal of equipment (servers, routers, UPS, air conditioning, etc.), interconnections, site security, space and energy consumption. But there are also hidden costs, particularly in terms of the human resources required. To guarantee continuity of service and intervene in the event of an incident. Wouldn't these skills, which are not easy to find and retain in a tight IT job market, be better allocated to activities closer to your core business than infrastructure management?

On all counts, outsourcing proves profitable, including when it comes to energy costs. CIV has announced a relatively modest rate increase for 2023, compared with the explosion in electricity prices.

What's more, the Cloud offers many advantages. By delegating the management of the hardware layer, you entrust the management of hardware incidents, the physical securing of the infrastructure and the procurement of new machines to a specialist. In short, you gain peace of mind, quality of service and agility.

Companies often put the brakes on migration in order to maximize the return on their on-premise IT investments. This is a calculation which, given the current economic climate, is proving increasingly risky. And if migration remains a delicate operation, it can be rapidly implemented with the right support. What's more, on-premise infrastructure can be recycled as a test or pre-production environment: it's not all a waste!

Scalair: a trusted, certified Cloud hosted in France to counter the energy crisis

Once the decision to migrate to the Cloud has been taken, the crucial question remains: which Cloud to choose? The Scalair Cloud, hosted by CIV at its Lille and Valenciennes sites, offers the best guarantees in terms of security and sovereignty.

What's more, CIV is recognized for its expertise and innovations in Green IT. Find out more in our article " How to reduce your cloud's carbon footprint ".

Would you like to outsource your IT infrastructure to data centers in France? While benefiting from the best guarantees in terms of data security and control?

Contact us for a no-obligation study: https://scalair.fr/contact/