DCD > Zero Downtime

In partnership with the DCD editorial team, Vertiv is proud to launch DCD>Zero Downtime, a podcast tracking the data center and digital infrastructure industry. Every two weeks, we will talk to one of the people that make this sector possible - from the people that build them, to those that finance them, to those researching new frontiers. Expect to hear from the industry's biggest names, toughest regulators, and smartest scientists.

Latest Episodes

Episode 14 - What it’s like building facilities for Google with Sarah Godbehere

What's it like building facilities for Google, in the epicenter of data center construction - Northern Virginia? Sarah Godbehere has spent the last three years managing construction on a Google campus in Northern Virginia. She tells us what it's like to be a young woman in an industry full of older men, and shares how she turns potential conflicts by asking the right questions.

Episode 13 - Carbon accounting and 24x7 green energy with Simone Accornero, FlexiDAO

When a data center firm claims to be 100 percent carbon neutral, can we believe them? Does every electron used in that data come from a solar panel or a wind farm? Until we have reliable carbon accounting, we won't know for sure, and operators will continue to rely on renewable energy certificates (RECs) which match energy consumption over a year, instead of hour by hour.

Episode 12 - Sustainability-linked financing and data centers, with Aligned’s Matthew Chambliss

As sustainability continues to become an increasingly important issue for data center owners and operators, many are tying their financing into ESG-related goals.

Episode 11 - Understanding Bitcoin power use after the crypto crash, with Alex de Vries

Cryptocurrency valuations are in freefall, causing mining to halve. But Bitcoin still consumes as much power as entire nations, amid a climate emergency. We talk to Digiconomist's Alex de Vries about the history of crypto, the crash, and learn just how much power the sector uses - and what it means for the planet.

Episode 10 - Working from home during the lockdown, with Alex Cruz Farmer, ThousandEyes

Alex Cruz Farmer of Cisco ThousandEyes has the tools to look objectively at the user experience of working from home during the lockdown and talks to us about how we can improve it.

Episode 9 - Hydrogen with Mark Monroe, Microsoft

Mark Monroe, Principal Engineer at Microsoft, explains how the hydrogen economy works. He shows us that hydrogen is not just a proven alternative to diesel for backup, but brings other benefits with it.

Episode 8 - The data center gender gap with Jacqueline van de Werken, Leaseweb

In this episode of the Zero Downtime podcast, we speak to Leaseweb general counsel Jacqueline van de Werken about how to encourage more women in the data center and cloud industry, and how to retain those that do join.

Episode 7 - Biodiversity & bees with Michelle Wallace, Host in Ireland

When you build a data center, you have to see the unintended consequences, says Michelle Wallace of data center promotion group Host In Ireland. Build badly, and local species will suffer. But it's also easy to get it wrong, to put in measures that don't help.

Episode 6 - Astrid Wynne Rogers, TechBuyer

In this podcast, Astrid Wynne Rogers, sustainability lead at TechBuyer tells us why we should pay close attention to the lifecycle of our physical servers and the other equipment in our facilities.

Episode 5 - Holland Barry, Cyxtera

Holland Barry, Field CTO for Cyxtera, discusses the role of the CTO and Field CTO at the company, the key skills required, and some of the interesting projects the company is working on.

Bonus Episode: Understanding Internet Connectivity in Ukraine & Russia, with Kentik's Doug Madory

DCD's Sebastian Moss talks to Doug Madory, the director of Internet analysis at Kentik, about the developing situation in Ukraine and Russia. We discuss telco disruptions, misinformation, false BGP hijacks, Cogent and Lumen's disconnection claims, whether Russia could drop off from the Internet, and more.

Episode 4 - Wes Swenson, Novva Data Centers

Data center automation is one thing, but what about automatons walking in the data halls? Robots in the data center are often discussed but rarely make it beyond the pilot project stage. Those that are deployed are often closer to Short Circuit’s Johnny 5 than Neill Blomkamp's CHAPPiE.

Episode 3 - Anders Andrae, Huawei Technologies

Figures quoted in 2021 suggested that data centers and communications technology could use eight percent or even 20 percent of the world's electricity by 2030. That seemed too high to us, so we tracked down the original source of the quotes, only to find he feels the same way.

Episode 2 - Max Schulze, the Sustainable Digital Infrastructure Alliance

Data centers are about as efficient as they ever can be, in terms of delivering power to servers and keeping them cool, so what's the next step to sustainable digital infrastructure? There is a lot of talk about reusing the wasted heat that facilities produce, but this seems like a hard job when all too often they can't give it away for free. Max Schulze is the founder of the Sustainable Digital Infrastructure Alliance (SDIA), a group of stakeholders aiming to achieve a sustainable digital infrastructure by 2030.

Episode 1 - Lex Coors, Interxion

In the first episode of the Zero Downtime podcast, we sit down with Lex Coors, winner of DCD's 2021 Outstanding Contribution to the Industry award and Chief Data Center Technology & Engineering Officer for Interxion. We spoke to Lex about his two decades at the company, from the early days, to the rise of cloud, and the recent Digital Realty acquisition. We also discussed sustainability efforts, the European energy crisis, and how to ensure that local communities don't turn against data centers.