Singapore-headquartered DayOne has broken ground on its first data centre in the city-state. Scheduled to be operational next year, the 20-megawatt (MW) facility will span about 40,000 square meters of gross floor area.
Designed with sustainability at its core, the facility will support high-density air-cooled graphics processing units (GPUs) powered by green energy. It will also incorporate hybrid air and liquid cooling technologies to efficiently manage heat-intensive artificial intelligence (AI) workloads.
As part of a proof-of-concept for hydrogen-based energy, DayOne will deploy Solid Oxide Fuel Cell (SOFC) power generation at the Singapore site, with the system expected to generate 0.3MW of power. The move aims to accelerate the adoption of cleaner energy solutions, diversify power sources for data centres, and support Singapore’s sustainability goals.
DayOne also plans to apply for both LEED Platinum and BCA Green Mark Platinum (GMDC:2024) certifications, aligning the facility with the highest environmental and energy efficiency standards.
“Our SG1 facility marks our commitment to Singapore as both home base and regional hub while highlighting our long-term vision to power Southeast Asia’s digital transformation with green infrastructure,” says DayOne Data Centers CEO Jamie Khoo. Beyond Singapore, DayOne also develops and operates data centres in Hong Kong SAR, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia and Thailand.
To achieve its goal of operating on 100% renewable electricity, DayOne has entered a 10-year Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Sembcorp Power, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sembcorp Industries. The energy supplied will be backed by bundled Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs), either sourced locally or imported via grid-to-grid connection. This agreement also sets the stage for future collaboration as DayOne scales its operations.
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“The rapid rise of AI infrastructure is driving unprecedented energy demand, and meeting this demand sustainably is critical to the future of the data centre industry. Our collaboration with DayOne reflects our commitment to powering the next-generation digital infrastructure with clean, future-ready solutions,” says Koh Chiap Khiong, president and CEO of Gas and Related Services and CEO for Singapore at Sembcorp Industries.
Additionally, DayOne is partnering with the National University of Singapore (NUS) to advance data centre innovation as part of the Sustainable Tropical Data Center Testbed Phase 2.0 (STDCT 2.0). The testbed includes pilot-scale trials of emerging cooling solutions designed specifically for tropical climates.
“Through STDCT 2.0, we are field testing breakthroughs –from flexible-fuel generators/fuel cells to next generation liquid cooling – to demonstrate that sustainability and high performance can go hand-in-hand. Together we’re laying the foundation for a new class of energy-efficient, climate-resilient digital infrastructure in Singapore and across the region,” says Professor Lee Poh Seng, STDCT Program director and head, Department of Mechanical Engineering for the College of Design and Engineering at NUS.
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DayOne’s Singapore facility is one of four sustainable data centre proposals approved in 2023 by the Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB) and the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA), which awarded capacity to the project.
This development supports Singapore’s broader ambition to add at least 300MW of data centre capacity in the near term, a key enabler of the city-state’s National AI Strategy 2.0.
