Interpretation | "Eastern Data and Western Computing" - "South-to-North Water Diversion" in the Digital Age

Recently, the National Development and Reform Commission and other departments issued a notice agreeing to start the construction of national computing hub nodes in Inner Mongolia, Guizhou and other places. This means that the "East-West Computing" project has been launched. Why is the "East-West Computing" project called the "South-to-North Water Diversion" in the digital age? Which cities and industries will be affected?

Written by reporter Zhao Tianyu, Photo and text editor Chen Yongjie

New Media Editor/Li Yunfeng Photography/Zhang Xinghai

▲Cover of Beijing Science and Technology News on February 28, 2022 (Subscription)

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The “East-West Computing” Project: “Water Diversion from South to North” in the Digital Age

Recently, the National Development and Reform Commission and other departments jointly issued a notice, agreeing to start the construction of national computing hub nodes in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, Yangtze River Delta, Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, Chengdu-Chongqing, Inner Mongolia, Guizhou, Gansu, and Ningxia, and planned 10 national data center clusters. So far, the overall layout design of the national integrated big data center system has been completed, and the "East Data West Computing" project has officially started in full swing.

According to the introduction, "East Data West Computing" is to guide the demand for computing power in the east to the west in an orderly manner by building a new computing power network system integrating data centers, cloud computing, and big data, optimize the layout of data center construction, and promote the coordinated linkage between the east and the west. Simply put, it is to allow the computing power resources in the west to more fully support the calculation of data in the east and better empower digital development.

▲ “East Data West Computing” project layout (drawing/Chai Qingyan)

It is understood that the national computing hub nodes will serve as the backbone connection points of my country's computing network. Within the eight computing hubs, 10 national data center clusters are further planned and established, namely Zhangjiakou cluster, Yangtze River Delta Ecological Green Integrated Development Demonstration Zone cluster, Wuhu cluster, Shaoguan cluster, Tianfu cluster, Chongqing cluster, Gui'an cluster, Horqin cluster, Qingyang cluster, and Zhongwei cluster.

It is reported that my country will accelerate the enhancement of the influence and agglomeration of the eight computing power hubs, and drive the integrated and coordinated development of national computing power. Strengthen the interconnection of network facilities; accelerate the opening of direct data connection channels between the east and the west, and create a number of "East Data West Computing" demonstration lines; optimize the communication network structure, upgrade the network node level of the national data center cluster, and improve the quality of network transmission.

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“Eastern Data, Western Computing” is not just about taking Eastern data to the Western regions for computation

"East Data West Computing" is another national-level project to optimize resource allocation and integrated layout after "South-to-North Water Diversion", "West-to-East Power Transmission" and "West-to-East Gas Transmission" in China. Although "East Data West Computing" can be simply understood as taking the data generated in the eastern region to the western region for calculation to better alleviate environmental and resource pressures, in fact, it spans many fields such as data, economy, resources, and energy, and the deep-seated logic and role behind it are more than that. In this regard, the Beijing Science and Technology Daily reporter invited three industry experts to interpret it.

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Development: Avoid “focusing on construction but neglecting application”

【Interview with experts】

Wang Yuanzhuo

Researcher, Institute of Computing Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Beijing Science and Technology News: After the Beijing Winter Olympics, the East-West Computing Project was officially launched. Why was the launch date chosen in February 2022? Is there any special significance?

Wang Yuanzhuo: The "East Data West Computing" project was indeed officially approved only recently, but in terms of timing, it was not deliberately chosen to start in 2022. In fact, the relevant state departments have already made arrangements in this regard, and this is a natural process.

From the policy context, in May 2021, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Cyberspace Administration of China, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, and the National Energy Administration issued the "Implementation Plan for the Computing Power Hub of the National Integrated Big Data Center Collaborative Innovation System", which clearly proposed the layout and construction of national hub nodes of the national computing power network, and accelerated the implementation of the "East Data West Computing" project. It also identified 8 national hub nodes, which are the same as the node areas recently approved.

On January 13 this year, the State Council issued the "14th Five-Year Plan for the Development of the Digital Economy", which once again deployed "East Data and West Computing" as an important chapter. To cope with the possible shortage of computing power resources, it is necessary to plan and respond in advance during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period.

Beijing Science and Technology Daily: In the specific implementation process of "East Data West Computing", what should we pay attention to from the perspectives of planning, construction and maintenance?

Wang Yuanzhuo: I think the most important thing is to start from the application perspective and make plans guided by demand during the actual operation process to avoid blindly launching projects that focus on construction but not application.

Based on past experience, national-level projects, due to their high social popularity and good economic benefits, are prone to being "rushed in" and "blindly built and invested" in various places. This has happened with new energy vehicles and chip manufacturing, which ultimately ended up being unfinished and even affected the development of the local economy.

The reason is that the construction was not really based on the demand side and the actual application perspective. The same is true for the "Eastern Data and Western Computing" this time. It does not mean that once the policy is released, we will immediately build dozens or hundreds of data centers in the western region and start computing. Instead, we must realize that although the eastern region has a relatively strong demand for computing power, this demand did not appear overnight, but increased in stages.

This requires the relevant departments to conduct a large amount of predictive research and make overall planning. Of course, such estimates may change and adjust in the later stage. Only when both the east and the west feel that it is cost-effective, it will be the most reasonable plan.

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Layout: Water and heat conditions are the most important considerations for building a data center

【Interview with experts】

Liu Chi

Vice Dean and Professor of School of Computer Science, Beijing Institute of Technology

Beijing Science and Technology Daily: How to accurately understand the "number" and "computing" in East Data and West Computing? We have noticed that "data center" and "computing power center" have appeared in parallel many times. What is the relationship between the two?

Liu Chi: "Eastern Data and Western Computing" can be understood as the "South-to-North Water Diversion" project in the digital economy era.

The main purpose of this project is to guide the computing power demand in the east to the west in an orderly manner, optimize the layout of data center construction, promote coordination and linkage between the east and the west, allow the computing power resources in the west to more fully support the calculation of data in the east, and better promote digital development.

The "number" in "East Number West Computing" refers to data. With the continuous expansion of people's online life, work, and entertainment scenarios, a large amount of data has been generated. In the past, the requirement for data was "ability to store", which is equivalent to a huge storage device, so the industry calls it a "data center."

However, with the rapid development of 5G, artificial intelligence, cloud computing and other fields, traditional storage functions can no longer meet user needs. Data storage devices must not only be able to store data, but also be able to calculate. Therefore, this storage device is now called a "computing power center," and it emphasizes "computing power" more.

So "computing center" and "data center" are essentially the same thing, but from a technical point of view, they are not quite the same. The computing center is the 2.0 version of the data center, an upgraded version of it. Compared with traditional data centers, computing centers have higher requirements for land, energy, climate and other conditions, which is one of the reasons for the implementation of the East Data West Computing Project.

Beijing Science and Technology News: Among the eight national computing power hub nodes, five are located in the western region, but they are basically distributed vertically along 105° east longitude, which is the intersection of the central and western regions. Compared with the West-to-East Power Transmission and West-to-East Gas Transmission, the "West" of East-to-West Computing seems to be closer to the "East". Why is this?

Liu Chi: Data centers are most likely to consume electricity and water. The reason for water consumption is the need for cooling. Therefore, when building a data center, water and heat conditions are the most important considerations, not that the closer to the power station the better.

From this perspective, the Yunnan-Guizhou-Sichuan region, especially Guizhou, which has a high altitude and good water resources, is the most suitable location for a big data center. Although the water resources in Inner Mongolia, Gansu, Ningxia and other places are not as good as those in Yunnan-Guizhou-Sichuan, they have suitable temperature conditions and abundant renewable energy, and they also have certain advantages.

From 105° east longitude further west, such as Tibet and Xinjiang, although the level of renewable energy is among the highest in the country, from a construction perspective, there are many unfavorable conditions such as high altitude, low temperature, strong wind and dust, and the maintenance cost is too high. The current ordinary civilian commercial computers have relatively weak capabilities in resisting cold, frost, high pressure and altitude, so they are no longer suitable for building data centers.

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Industry: Green energy industry is expected to benefit

【Interview with experts】

Liu Shiping

Professor of University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Director of Financial Technology Research Center

Beijing Science and Technology Daily: Is “Eastern Data and Western Computing” a “very necessary” plan like “dual carbon”?

Liu Shiping: From the perspective of the macro level, actual needs and economic development, it is very necessary to start "Eastern Data and Western Computing".

From a macro perspective, the digital economy has become a new engine driving economic growth. Data is the core element of the digital economy, and computing power is the core productivity of the digital economy. The rapid development of digital technology and digital economy has become a major trend, and the demand for computing power in the whole society is very urgent. It is expected to continue to grow rapidly at a rate of more than 20% each year. It can be seen that a large number of computing centers will be built in the next few years.

From the perspective of actual needs, the distribution of existing data centers in my country is more in the east and less in the west, and related infrastructure is distributed nearby. For example, the Alibaba Cloud data center is located near Qiandao Lake in Zhejiang. However, the eastern region is densely populated, land and energy are becoming increasingly scarce, and data computing is particularly power-consuming and wastes water.

It just so happens that the western region is rich in energy resources such as electricity and has cheap electricity prices; the southwestern region is rich in water resources and vast in space resources, which can meet the huge demand for computing power in the eastern region, and it is a benign complementary opportunity.

From the perspective of economic development, our country has achieved a comprehensive well-off society in 2020. For the western region, "Eastern Data and Western Computing" can well drive the development of the local digital economy, drive infrastructure construction, increase employment, form an industrial effect, and help promote the development of the western region and regional balanced and coordinated development.

Beijing Science and Technology News: With the full launch of the "Eastern Data and Western Computing" project, it is estimated that it will attract 400 billion yuan of investment each year, and the total market size will exceed one trillion yuan in three years. Which industries or sectors will benefit significantly?

Liu Shiping: The industry that will benefit the most is probably the green energy industry. Data centers are also known as "smokeless factories" because they consume a lot of electricity. The power of a single cabinet is around 3-6kW, and the power of a high-performance supercomputing data center cabinet can reach 20-30kW, so it is very tight in the eastern region.

Judging from the current energy structure, 70% of the power supply for data centers comes from coal-fired power (thermal power). This is related to the characteristics of power consumption in data centers, because green electricity is not yet stable enough to provide continuous supply, and what data centers fear most is power outages. Of course, this is also related to our country's power structure.

In the future, under the “dual carbon” goal, there is great potential for wind power, photovoltaic power generation to supply data centers, and hydropower generation in Yunnan, Guizhou and Sichuan regions.

The upstream infrastructure industry will also benefit. For example, the Qixing Disaster Recovery Data Center in Gui'an, Guizhou, has a total area of ​​470,000 square meters, with the tunnel area alone exceeding 30,000 square meters. More such data centers will be built in the future, bringing huge opportunities to civil engineering parties and equipment manufacturers.

In addition, data centers have a large number of machines and equipment that require the support of high-performance computing chips: the demand for related high-performance computing chips, communication chips, interface chips and other hardware facilities is expected to increase. This can drive the development of intelligent manufacturing, especially domestic high-end chips.

Beijing Science and Technology News: Compared with our country, how do Europe and North America deploy such computing centers? Are they also troubled by energy issues?

Liu Shiping: According to statistics from Synergy Research Group, as of 2020, the number of hyperscale data centers in the world has increased to 659, more than half of which are located in the United States and China, so China has become a world leader in this regard.

There are not many data centers in Europe. On the one hand, Europe is still in the era of "credit society" and the Internet penetration rate is low. On the other hand, many European companies operate across borders and throughout Europe, with mobile networks as the core, which is not the same concept as the Internet of big data centers.

American Internet companies like Amazon, Microsoft, Google and IBM each have 60 or more data centers, but it should be noted that these data centers are not all located in the United States. They are also deployed in the Asia-Pacific region, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and Latin America. These are also called offshore data centers. Apple’s data center in China, “Cloud Guizhou”, is a typical example. Of course, this needs to be based on a large number of local users, otherwise the cost will be too high.

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Produced by: Beijing Science and Technology News | Beijing Science and Technology Media

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