Case Study · Compute / HPC reference deployment · Italy 2024
When A2A set out to launch a new data center at its Lamarmora plant in Brescia, Italy, the challenge was clear: how could a city of 200,000 people turn the growing energy demands of digital infrastructure into local benefit? The answer came through a pioneering partnership with Qarnot and RackRenew, transforming the data center from a traditional energy consumer into a vital source of sustainable urban heat.
1,350
Apartments served with recovered heat (Phase 2 target, A2A)
3,500 t
CO₂ avoided per year (Phase 2 target, A2A)
65°C
Heat recovery temp
800 MWh
Thermal output per year, Phase 1 operating today
The Challenge
Harnessing Waste Heat for Citywide Benefit
Data centers are notorious for their energy consumption and the vast amounts of heat they generate: heat that typically goes to waste. A2A, one of Italy’s largest utility companies, wanted to flip that narrative. The goal: capture server-generated heat and use it to warm homes and buildings across Brescia.
The challenge was to design a system that could efficiently recover high-temperature thermal energy and integrate it into the city’s existing district heating grid, all while supporting high-performance computing needs for Italian industries.
The Solution
Liquid-Cooled HPC Servers Powering a Circular Economy
Qarnot, a French innovator in sustainable IT, deployed advanced liquid-cooled pods housing RackRenew’s remanufactured OCP servers at the Lamarmora plant. This setup captures thermal energy at up to 65°C, which is then fed directly into Brescia’s district heating network.
The data center serves as a national HPC cloud provider, supporting Italian industries with high-performance computing while ensuring energy efficiency. The collaboration showcases how second-life servers can power demanding applications while contributing to urban heating. A first for Italy, and a milestone for Europe.
The Results
Sustainable Heat, Scalable Impact
1,350
Apartments served with recovered heat (Phase 2 target, A2A)
3,500 t
CO₂ avoided per year (Phase 2 target, A2A)
16 GWh
Thermal output per year (Phase 2 target, A2A)
65°C
Heat recovery temperature
800 MWh
Thermal output per year, Phase 1 operating today
Why This Matters
Compute and sustainability as reinforcing priorities
This project demonstrates what happens when circular IT infrastructure meets smart urban planning. Instead of treating compute and sustainability as competing priorities, A2A, Qarnot, and RackRenew built a system where they reinforce each other.
Running HPC or data-lake storage on a research budget? The whitepaper Petabyte Economics for Research & Education sets out the economics per rack.
About the Partners
1 Based on RackRenew like-for-like reference comparisons of remanufactured switch, compute node, and storage node configurations against the market price of equivalent new equipment, held on file by RackRenew. Where a comparison involves a model no longer sold new, RackRenew states that in the comparison.
2 Actual lead times depend on final customer configuration, component availability and destination. RackRenew does not guarantee delivery windows on this website.
3 RackRenew assigns the embodied carbon of a component to its first owner, who incurred the manufacturing emissions at original purchase. A component that enters a second service life through remanufacture is counted at zero embodied carbon for the second owner.
