On the 1st June 2024, in the context of the Science City Day, organized in Hamburg Bahrenfeld, our partner DESY opened its doors to the public. Visitors had access to the experimental halls, accelerator tunnels and laboratories, where the researchers shared their fascination for science with more than 100 activities and talks.
One of the many interesting activities was a guided tour of the DESY data centre, which is one of the largest scientific computing centres in northern Germany. Researchers gave visitors an insight into the performance, energy and operation of computers.
With the help of a bicycle ergometer, visitors were able to measure themselves and find out how much computing power they could generate with their own muscle power. Yves Kemp, head of the systems group of DESY IT explains the background of this campaign: “Our intention was to raise awareness of the fact that the proportion of electricity consumed by computer centres, including scientific data centres, is constantly increasing.”
As part of the RF2.0 project, DESY is developing methods to reverse this trend by pursuing a more sustainable use of the available resources of energy and recyclable materials.
