New Delhi, Jan. 30 -- India is rapidly cementing its position as South Asia's data centre hub, accounting for most of the region's capacity and investment. The sector is expected to attract $5.7 billion in investment and drive demand for 10 million square feet of real estate, presenting a highly promising outlook. However, this growth also brings a responsibility to build infrastructure that is scalable, resilient, and environmentally sustainable.
Sustainability is no longer optional-It is integral to cost control, regulatory compliance, and competitive advantage in AI-driven economies. The risk of climate-induced infrastructure damage is projected to nearly triple between 2025 and 2100, underscoring the urgent need to future-proof India's digital backbone.
As enterprises adopt next-generation technologies such as AI, traditional data centre models built for static workloads are becoming inadequate. India's data centre capacity is projected to grow from 1.4 gigawatts in 2023 to 9 gigawatts by 2030. While this could raise energy consumption to nearly 3 percent of national electricity use, it also creates a critical opportunity to innovate energy-efficient, sustainable infrastructure.
Increasingly, businesses recognize that energy efficiency is not just a regulatory requirement but a long-term competitive advantage, driving investment in advanced, environmentally aligned infrastructure that supports AI innovation.
Smarter, carbon-conscious infrastructure
Enterprises are addressing the dual challenge of performance and environmental responsibility by adopting smarter, carbon-conscious infrastructure. Cloud-native, AI-optimized platforms enable predictive maintenance, self-healing systems, and improved resource optimization, enhancing data centre reliability while reducing costs and carbon emissions.
Another emerging approach is carbon-aware computing, which shifts workloads to times and locations with cleaner energy availability. This maintains performance while lowering environmental impact through greater use of renewable energy.
AI also plays a critical role in optimizing workloads and storage by reducing data bloats, cutting energy use from idle systems, and minimizing unnecessary data retention. Together, these advances improve efficiency and position infrastructure as an active enabler of enterprise ESG goals.
Circular thinking in infrastructure design
India's regulatory landscape is driving enterprises toward more responsible infrastructure planning. Frameworks such as Business Responsibility and Sustainability Reporting (BRSR) require detailed disclosures on energy use, emissions, and resource efficiency, making sustainability a board-level priority for listed companies.
Sustainability extends beyond energy to materials and lifecycle management. As a result, organizations are adopting circular infrastructure models that emphasize repair, reuse, and recycling to reduce hardware-related environmental impact. New systems are increasingly designed for modularity and disassembly, enabling component replacement without discarding entire units, while some providers now use recycled materials in manufacturing.
This shift from consumption-led to regeneration-focused infrastructure reduces waste, improves long-term ROI, and strengthens alignment with ESG standards.
From AI adoption to AI-optimised sustainability
While AI has myriad benefits, it is already emerging as a key sustainability enabler. Enterprises are using AI to optimize infrastructure-for example, AI-driven cooling has significantly reduced Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE), lowering both operational costs and carbon footprints. AI-enabled dynamic scaling also adjusts compute, storage, and network resources in real time to avoid energy waste.
AI-driven storage tiering further improves efficiency by analysing data access patterns and placing hot, warm, and cold data on the most appropriate storage tiers. This reduces unnecessary flash usage, lowers idle power draw, and cuts cooling requirements.
Together, these advances signal a shift from infrastructure that merely supports AI to infrastructure actively optimised by it. Organisations that successfully integrate innovation, advanced technologies, and sustainability will be best positioned to achieve responsible, scalable, and climate-conscious growth.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from TechCircle.