Elea Digital debuts Latin America’s first sustainability-linked bond issued by a data center operator
Elea Digital, a provider of edge data center services, has announced that it has secured the first sustainability-linked bond in the Latin American data center market. This R $200 million (USD 38 million ) green issuance is a noteworthy milestone in digital infrastructure across Brazil. It features Bradesco BBI as the lead coordinator and BTG and UBS/BB as coordinators.
Elea Digital is taking strides to become more efficient by investing in advanced, sustainable equipment. This technology will enable the data centers to cool themselves with less water while maintaining efficient energy usage.
Alessandro Lombardi, the chairperson at Elea Digital, expressed his satisfaction with the project: “Today, Elea Digital takes the lead on the commitment to sustainability in the digital infrastructure sector in Brazil. We trust other players may be inspired by our pioneer path.”
Three of Brazil’s most prominent financial institutions also supported the transaction and showed adherence to environmental and social goals. Rafael Garcia, head of fixed income at Bradesco BBI, said: “We are proud to be lead coordinator of the first sustainability-linked bond of Elea Digital, which also is the first one in the data center industry. By committing to environmental and social targets, the company innovates and fosters sustainable practices in a relevant sector.”
Elea Digital’s Water Usage Efficiency (WUE) was 0.51 liters per KW/h of consumed energy in September 2022. With an approximate six-year timeline, Water Usage Efficiency (WUE) may fall to 0.31 by 2026 and decrease to 0.20 liters per KW/h in 2028. These totals compare to Brazil’s current average consumption of 7.6 liters per KW/h.
Lombardi continued, “We understand that Brazil, with its abundance of water resources, sun and wind, can become a global sustainability model in the data center sector. Furthermore, we must, especially in the country of the Amazon region, reaffirm our climate commitment, working every day to promote a digital transformation that improves the quality of the world we live in.”
Elea Digital was founded in 2018 to bring digital infrastructure via data centers to Brazil. Since then, it has gained five data centers from Oi in 2020 and Grupo Globo’s data center in 2021. In 2022, it purchased another data center from TIM in Porto Alegre. The company says that by issuing this sustainability-linked bond, Elea Digital reaffirms its commitment to providing sustainable digital infrastructure.
Elea’s issuance in Latin America follows similar announcements from other global data center providers. For example, EdgeConneX announced earlier in 2022 that it secured a total of $1.7 billion to accelerate global expansion and develop sustainable data center solutions. pend on EdgeConneX achieving certain pre-determined sustainability targets. These targets will be aligned with EdgeConneX’s ESG sustainability strategy to develop more energy-efficient data centers across the globe. EdgeConneX pledges to be carbon, water, and waste neural by 2030 and operate a data center platform on 100% renewable energy.
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Article Topics
bond | Brazil | cooling systems | edge data center | Elea Digital | ESG | funding | sustainability
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