With environmental, social, and governance (ESG) risk-based disclosures and spending on ESG services on the rise, it's clear the data center industry is "in a position for increased risk from climate change induced by extreme weather events," CyrusOne SVP of Operations and Customer Success Andrea Munoz told SDxCentral.

Extreme heat and drought aggravated by climate change puts stress on electrical grids and water supplies, while extreme weather like tornadoes and hurricanes pose risks of structural damage and power loss, further exacerbating electricity and water systems, Munoz explained.

In light of this, she urged data centers to prioritize allocating resources to business continuity and disaster recovery planning. "That's critically important. You have to put the time into it," she said.

"Make sure your teams are mounting an appropriate response through planning, training, drilling, crisis simulation, and we need to continue to focus on innovation so that we can reduce carbon and water utilization and continue to focus on ensuring we design for these changing environmental conditions," Munoz said.

Extreme weather like hurricanes can cause water and structural damage to a data center building, along with increased physical and mental demand for on-site personnel, who often have to shelter in place at the facility for an unknown length of time during a hurricane event. And in extreme cases, hurricanes can result in the loss of life, Munoz explained.

CyrusOne's data centers in Houston, Texas were impacted by Hurricane Harvey in 2017, which "provided us with the opportunity to put into practice what we plan and train for," Munoz said. During the provider's experience with Hurricane Harvey, "we maintained 100% uptime, so that was fantastic. And that's because it's all about preparation," she added.

"We do everything we can to simulate those types of events so that when they do occur, we're prepared and ready when it comes to the impacts that extreme weather can have on data centers," Munoz said.

The first measure CyrusOne has in place is a threat intelligence platform that identifies when an extreme storm is forming. The platform notifies the company so it can gather a storm team to monitor the storm's progression, she said.

If a watch becomes a warning, the company initiates what it calls a preparedness bridge. "We get all of the folks that are representing the response team — such as the facility operations folks, security, service delivery, even HR, safety, network — we get all those folks together," she explained.

This group then walks through its hurricane emergency response checklist, which includes tasks like checking generator fuel levels, critical equipment checks on batteries that power cooling mechanisms, and ensuring vendors are on standby in case their expertise is required.

The provider also works to anticipate what customer demand will be during extreme weather events. "Particularly with Hurricane Harvey, there was a lot of road flooding, and customers did not want to send their team members in, so they were able to leverage our on-site team to go into their spaces and be those remote hands and eyes, and assist them," Munoz explained.