Ett decennium av banbrytande arbete för hållbar digital infrastruktur

Cloud services were expanding, digitalisation was gaining speed, and the need for computing capacity was growing rapidly. At the same time, questions around energy, cooling, robustness and sustainability were becoming increasingly central. ICE Datacenter at RISE was established to meet precisely this development: as a place where companies, researchers and public-sector actors could test, develop and understand the data centres and digital infrastructure of the future in practice.

Over the past ten years, the environment has grown from a regional research initiative into an internationally recognised test and innovation environment for sustainable digital infrastructure. Here, researchers, companies and public-sector actors have been able to test ideas in real-world environments, long before they become finished products, standards or large-scale investments.

– Scania has analysed truck data here. The Swedish National Space Agency has developed a national platform for satellite data together with ICE. And Swedish companies, large and small, have gained access to computing power, test environments and expertise that they would never have been able to finance on their own, says Isabelle Kemlin, Business and Innovation Executive

The ten-year anniversary is more than an occasion to celebrate. It is also an opportunity to look back at what has been built, understand the shifts that have shaped the journey, and at the same time look ahead to the next chapter for sustainable, robust and AI-ready digital infrastructure.

The power of the north

The journey began already in 2014, with a feasibility study on how the strengths of northern Sweden could be used to attract new electricity-intensive industry. The region offered the climate, the energy, the industrial expertise and the opportunity to take a leading role in a rapidly growing international sector.

The questions were both concrete and strategic: How do we build digital infrastructure that can meet the demands of the future? How do we test new solutions before they are deployed at scale? And how can northern Sweden’s climate, energy systems and industrial ecosystem contribute to more sustainable development?

These were some of the questions behind the establishment of ICE Datacenter at RISE and they still drive the internationally recognised data centre environment in Luleå today.

The first concrete step was to build a new type of research and innovation environment for data centres and digital infrastructure. The following year, financing, implementation planning and strategic partnerships were secured.

When ICE Datacenter at RISE opened in 2016, it offered a live environment where real experiments, testing and applied research could be carried out together with partners including Luleå University of Technology and industry actors.

It marked an important shift. From idea to place. From strategy to actual infrastructure.

Real-world testing for the digital infrastructure of the future

What has made ICE Datacenter at RISE unique is the ability to test for real. Not only in simulated environments or small-scale labs, but with real equipment, actual operational data and conditions similar to those the industry faces in practice.

– It is only when you test under real-world conditions that you see what works. Here, we can test future solutions before they reach the market, make measurements and understand the technology before it is scaled up — and do so at lower cost and risk than in a full-scale production environment, says Tor Björn Minde, Director.

In the early years, much of the focus was on energy efficiency, operations, cooling and sustainability in cold climates. As the needs around digital infrastructure grew, ICE Datacenter at RISE grew too. Over time, the environment became a broader platform where academia, industry and society could come together around AI, cloud infrastructure, edge computing, energy systems, space data and smart infrastructure.

Sustainability has been a central part of ICE Datacenter at RISE from the very beginning. Through projects in heat recovery, industrial symbiosis, district heating and advanced cooling technology, ICE has explored how data centres can become an active part of larger and more resource-efficient systems.

This has also been visible in some of the most memorable experiments, where surplus heat has been used in unexpected ways: to dry fruit, berries and biomass, heat greenhouses, enable hydroponic cultivation and even in trials involving mealworm farming.

Together, these experiments became concrete examples of a larger idea: that data centres do not only have to be energy consumers, but can also become active parts of local, circular and resource-efficient systems.

– We have wanted to challenge the image of the data centre as an isolated box. This type of infrastructure needs to be connected to energy systems, industry and local communities in smart ways, says Isabelle Kemlin.

From 2021 onwards, development accelerated. The work broadened towards edge computing, 5G, AI and cloud-edge architectures, while the partner programme strengthened collaboration with some of the world’s leading companies. ICE Datacenter at RISE thus became a meeting place for international actors, specialist companies and research partners.

– During these years, more than one hundred companies have been involved in ICE, from major international actors such as ABB, Ericsson, Vattenfall, Meta, Google, Vertiv, Alfa Laval, Grundfos and Castrol to smaller specialist companies and research partners. It is that mix that has made ICE so strong, says Tor Björn Minde.

That breadth has also produced concrete results. A world record helped cement the role of ICE Datacenter at RISE within sustainable digital infrastructure. In the EU project Boden Type DC, the organisation contributed to building one of the world’s most energy-efficient data centres. The facility achieved an exceptionally low PUE value of 1.015, setting a world record in energy-efficient data centre operation.

The role was further strengthened when ICE Datacenter at RISE was later appointed a European Demonstration Centre within the Open Compute Project. This positioned the organisation as an international environment for open, energy-efficient and sustainable data centre solutions. By 2023 and 2024, ICE Datacenter at RISE had developed into a clear centre of expertise for sustainable, robust and AI-ready digital infrastructure.

When infrastructure meets AI

The rapid development of AI is now changing the conditions for digital infrastructure. Large AI models and advanced computing clusters are driving growing demand for computing capacity, power supply, cooling and robust systems. Behind every model is high-performance hardware, denser racks and new requirements for power, heat management and integration with energy systems.

– AI is completely changing the playing field. It is not just about more computing power, but about entirely new demands on electricity, cooling, heat management and how data centres are connected to society’s energy systems, says Jonas Gustafsson, Senior Researcher.

This is where ICE Datacenter at RISE becomes particularly relevant. What could previously be seen as experimental, such as liquid cooling, heat recovery, smart grid integration and energy-optimised operations, is now becoming a practical necessity. Projects such as H-DINI are already investigating the infrastructure challenges linked to AI and high-performance computing, while ICE’s infrastructure lab is expanding with capacity for 2.5 MW of electricity and more than 5 MW of available heat load for experiments.

This creates new opportunities to test the AI infrastructure of the future before it is built out at scale. At the same time, it makes ICE Datacenter at RISE relevant to some of the most decisive questions of our time: Europe’s digital competitiveness, technological sovereignty, climate transition and societal resilience.

Ten years of innovation, and the beginning of the next chapter

This year, ICE Datacenter at RISE celebrates ten years of innovation, collaboration and pioneering work for sustainable digital infrastructure.

In connection with the anniversary, we have taken the opportunity to look back at a development that has shaped both the region and the industry – but above all, to look ahead.

Because if the first ten years were about building a unique test and demonstration environment for sustainable data centres, the next chapter is about meeting the demands now being placed by AI, high-performance computing and an increasingly digitalised society.

Subscribe to the ICE Datacenter at RISE newsletter to discover more stories from the first ten years and follow the development towards the next chapter for sustainable, robust and AI-ready digital infrastructure.