80% of the world's data centres have been built in places either too hot or too cold for the hardware inside

A processed photo of a data center server room, showing racks of computers lit by overhead lights, reflecting off the ground.

There are close to 9,000 data centres currently in operation across the globe—and a sizable chunk of that has been built in climates far too hot for all of that hardware to run efficiently. That's definitely not great news when some estimate the number of data centres will triple by 2030.

According to a report from Rest of World, the optimal temperature range for a data centre lies between 18 °C and 27 °C (or 64.4 °F and 80.6 °F). However, of the 8,808 data centres in operation, 7,000 have been built in places that typically experience a climate outside of this range. Furthermore, 600 (or about 10% of all data centres) have been built in places that regularly breach that temperate 27 °C ceiling (via Tom's Hardware).