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Despite its name, Schneider Electric does not produce electricity. It is an energy management company, mixing electrification and digitization together so that customers know exactly where their energy is consumed and can optimize their energy consumption in real time.
It is the largest energy management supplier for data centers, which represent approximately a quarter of his activities, and he works with Chipmaker and Wall Street Powerhouse Nvidia.
Schneider announced in June that he would collaborate with Nvidia to meet the growing demand for sustainable infrastructure and ready for IT. It was a research and development partnership for power, cooling, control and high density rack systems to allow the next generation of AI factories across Europe and finally beyond.
Last month, Schneider announced new highly technical and detailed data center plans, developed with NVIDIA, which, according to the company, will considerably accelerate construction times as well as to help operators adopt an infrastructure ready for AI.
The first part is the integrated energy management and liquid cooling systems. The second is a framework for the development of the new Blackwell chips from Nvidia.
“We make sure, with each generation they come out, that the solution that we bring together will minimize energy consumption to feed their facilities,” said Jean-Pascal Tricoire, president of Schneider Electric. “These chips, which feed the AI or the activation of the AI, are chips that consume a lot of energy, and you must cool them directly on the chip by bringing liquid directly to the chip.”
The partnership could prove to be extremely lucrative, in particular given the recent investment of $ 100 billion from Nvidia in Openai. More data centers will mean more demand not only for energy but also energy management.
“We are entering a new era of accelerated computer science, where integrated intelligence through power, cooling and operations will redefine architectures in the data center,” said Scott Wallace, director of engineering at Nvidia, in a press release on new Schneider conceptions.
In a positive feedback loop, AI helps increase energy efficiency, even if it aspires more energy. It is not only in data centers, but in the entire built environment.
“To make it very simple, AI can help gain efficiency four times more than it consumes, at least four to nine times more,” said Trice.
Energy consumption was already digitized, but it had been difficult to optimize this on a large scale.
“Today, for the first time, we have computer engines that can integrate all the complexity of what you do, what I do, what this data center does, what the network can power, what this power station can produce, what this solar roof can do, in real time and ensure that we consume much better at the right time, the right type of energy. So, it’s a digital energy revolution.
The proliferation of energy sources, including solar energy, wind, geothermal energy and nuclear, creates a decentralized energy production model. It is one of the largest changes on the market.
“If your house no longer consumes electricity, because you are independent with solar batteries, because you recharge your electric vehicle, it means that you have released enough energy to supply a fraction of this data center which is close to you,” said Trice. “We can all become, in our companies, in our homes, in our daily life, in professional life, actors of this transition, which is more efficient and more sustainable.”
Tricoire highlighted other geographies, such as Europe, India and China, which turn to electrification due to a lack of fossil fuels. For them, it is the only way to be more competitive. He said that this will lead to a new innovation in the sector and will push American companies to follow the plunge – even despite political -contrary winds in the United States for renewable energies.
“Companies are very pragmatic. If a solution earns money, they will go, right? And if, in addition, it is better for their imprint, they will go even faster,” said Tricoire. “There is so much innovation that takes place today, and the cost curves of new technologies decrease so quickly, that companies adopt new ways of doing things.”
Tricoire has been with the company for almost 40 years and said that he has never seen the type of dramatic and rapid maturity and the growth of the energy technology he is seeing at the moment.
“I think that people completely underestimate the revolution that will occur in the field of energy in the upcoming two decades,” said tricoire, adding that the combination of electrification technologies, as well as digitization, increased to a whole new level by AI, creates a certain number of possibilities that we have never seen before.
“And the big news is that it is not things that should be deployed in 10 years, 20 years. These are technologies that should be or can be deployed today with a big economic return,” said tricoire.