Octopus Energy’s generation business will invest £200 million investment in London-based Deep Green to help it rapidly scale its groundbreaking technology across the UK.
Related article: Waste supercomputer heat and old mines could warm homes
Processing data generates a great deal of heat. Deep Green has developed heat re-use technology to stop this heat going to waste, instead using it to provide free heat for energy-intensive organisations such as leisure centres. By teaming up with Deep Green, a public swimming pool in Devon was able to slash its pool heating bill by over 60%.
In return, Deep Green gets free cooling, which provides it with a significant competitive edge over traditional data centres. This allows it to offer more affordable, highly energy-efficient computing to businesses across the UK.
Deep Green’s customers require data centre processing for a range of uses including AI, machine learning, video rendering or cloud applications. Its current customers include York University, and the company has signed partnerships with industry suppliers Civo and Alces Flight who offer the servers to their customers.
The substantial investment in Deep Green is being made via Octopus’ dedicated Octopus Energy Transition Fund (OETF) and the Sky (ORI SCSp) fund it manages.
Octopus Energy Generation CEO Zoisa North-Bond said, “To tackle the energy crisis head-on, we need innovative solutions to unusual problems. By using excess heat from data centres to slash energy bills for communities across the UK, Deep Green solves two problems with one solution. We’re looking forward to rapidly rolling this out and positively impacting even more people as we drive towards a cleaner, cheaper energy future.”
Related article: Octopus snaps up Queensland’s largest proposed battery
Deep Green founder and CEO Mark Bjornsgaard commented, “We are thrilled with Octopus’s commitment to support our next phase of growth. Placing data centres within the fabric of society transforms the waste heat they produce into a valuable resource that benefits communities.”
