- Water connects everything we do in life.
But too often it's overlooked or taken for granted.
In the next 10 years,
over half the world's population
is expected to be living in areas affected by water scarcity
and climate change is only making that worse.
The good news is that there are many solutions out there
that can help us address these water challenges.
All right.
so all this is just going all the time.
Okay. Okay.
I'm Will Hughes and I'm the water sustainability lead
at Amazon Web Services.
I was originally attracted to water
because I saw a lot of opportunity to bring solutions
to those water challenges.
And a company like AWS can bring its core competence
to help solve them too.
AWS is committing to be water positive by 2030.
That means we'll return more water
to communities in the environment
than we use in our operations.
We'll meet the water positive goal in two different ways.
We're working with non-profit partners around the world
to invest in projects that increase water availability
in the communities where we operate.
Second, we're working within our data centers
to implement innovative solutions
that help us improve water efficiency
and reduce our water use.
- Ideally, we don't wanna use any water.
That's what I'm after.
I wanna solve that.
I'm Suresh Soundaraj.
And I'm a principal mechanical engineer at AWS.
My job here is to design the most efficient cooling systems
for our data centers.
We only use water for cooling
when we absolutely need to.
So when we can, we take advantage of the weather.
During cooler months,
the outside area is directly pulled into our server rooms
to keep our hardware at a safe operating temperature
But this doesn't work when it's very hot outside
especially during summer months
so that's when we need to use water for cooling.
During hotter months, we use an evaporative cooling system
which pulls in outside air
and forces it through water soaked cooling pads.
The water evaporates, reducing the air's temperature
and the cool air is then directly supplied
into the server rooms.
To fine tune our cooling operation,
we installed sensors
that track the weather parameters
like temperature and humidity.
As soon as the conditions drop to a safe operating range
the evaporative cooling system shuts off
and cool areas directly supplied into the server rooms.
We're continuously innovating
and improving our cooling system
so that it's the most sustainable
and efficient option out there.
- In the past, we used drinkable water for cooling
but we've started looking for more sustainable options.
I'm Chris Lee and I'm a facility manager at AWS.
I'm a Bay Area native and an average fisherman,
so I spend a lot of time on the water.
Throughout the years living in the Bay Area,
I've seen the water levels in these lake and reservoirs
go down significantly.
Water scarcity is a real challenge across California
which is not only why we're reducing
the amount of water we use,
but changing the type of water we use for cooling.
AWS has data centers located in the city of Santa Clara
which has a system of piping
that delivers recycled water to their customers.
The water that nobody really wants to use
just goes down the the drain.
It goes through a chemical treatment plant.
And we get to see the benefits of reusing it again.
It saves us from using the water
in these lakes and reservoirs.
And in California every drop counts.
Specifically if you're fisherman
- In Umatilla, Oregon,
where some of our data centers are located,
farming is at the heart of the community.
To help support the local economy
and reduce our water footprint.
We created a way to help farmers reuse our cooling water
for irrigation.
I'm Kelly Galway
and I'm a water resources data manager at AWS.
At our Oregon data centers,
96% of our spent cooling water
is used for irrigating crops
like corn, wheat, and soybeans.
To make sure the water water's safe enough for irrigation
we installed sensors that monitor water quality.
The sensors continuously collect data
and AWS IoT gateways transmit the data to the cloud
for analysis and automated alarming.
If there are any water quality issues
we're instantly alerted.
- [Interviewer] What is an IoT gateway?
- Great question.
IoT stands for Internet of Things.
And IoT Gateway means it's a computer
that can send data to the cloud
without being connected to Wi-Fi
or any kind of local internet.
We've leveraged the power of the AWS Cloud
offering a secure solution to collect data
and scale the program very easily going forward.
Do you wanna do it again?
Claire will be better at Rams.
(laughs)
- I'm Claire Biddle
And I'm a resource...
I'm getting it wrong.
What am I again?
Water resource.
I'm Claire Biddle.
And I'm a water resource manager at AWS.
Returning water back to the environment
is a huge part of us becoming water positive.
In the United Kingdom,
we are working with the charity, The Rivers Trust
and local trusts, Action for the River Kennet
to create two wetlands on the tributary of the River Thames.
This is one of London's main sources of drinkable water,
but drought and pollution
are threatening the region's long term water security.
The creation of wetlands will help with this
because they act as natural filtration systems.
The plants within the wetlands slow the water flow
which remove nutrients and sediments.
The wetlands will also help recharge local ground water
which makes the area more resilient to drought.
AWS is already investing
in nature based solutions around the world.
Each one of these projects
is delivering improved water quality
and availability for the surrounding communities.
- I'm hopeful because we're seeing more innovation
in the water sector than we've ever seen before.
We're seeing new technologies
that can fundamentally change
how we address these water challenges.
And AWS is excited to be part
of driving those innovations forward.
We have industry leading water efficiency.
And 20 of our data centers
are using sustainable recycled water,
and we've supported projects that have brought clean water
and sanitation services
to nearly 300,000 people in India and Indonesia.
We're also working to reach net zero carbon emissions
by 2040 as part of the climate pledge
which Amazon committed to in 2019.
And with each change, we're making a more sustainable future
for our company and our customers,
but most importantly
we're making a better future for our planet.