[Interview] AWS Vice President: "Power Demand Must Be Met with Carbon-Neutral Energy... Focus on SMR"

Kerry Person, Vice President of Data Center Planning and Operations at Amazon Web Services (AWS), Amazon

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"Nuclear energy is one of the fastest ways to meet increasing energy demand while addressing climate change."

Kerry Person, Vice President in charge of data center planning and operations at Amazon Web Services (AWS), stated this in a written interview with Asia Economy on the 17th, describing nuclear power as a "new carbon-neutral energy." AWS is Amazon's cloud computing division, operating data centers worldwide. In South Korea, it is working with SK Innovation E&S to build a 60-megawatt (MW) solar power plant.

Person mentioned nuclear energy while promoting the expansion of data centers because it is almost the only option among zero-carbon energies capable of meeting electricity demand.

Amazon is a company participating in the "Climate Pledge," which aims to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2040. Person explained, "Last year, we achieved the goal of matching 100% of the electricity consumed in all AWS operations with renewable energy sources."

Amazon believes that renewable energy alone is insufficient to achieve carbon neutrality. The company's definition of "carbon-neutral energy" includes not only renewable energy but also nuclear power. He stated, "Amazon's carbon-neutral energy portfolio consists of large-scale solar and wind power plants, rooftop or ground-mounted solar power plants, battery storage projects, and several nuclear projects."

Amazon is making bold investments not only in renewable energy but also in nuclear fields such as Small Modular Reactors (SMRs). Person explained, "Developing new carbon-neutral energy sources is necessary to meet increasing energy demand. SMRs are smaller reactors that can be built faster, cost less, and their compact size offers greater flexibility in selecting installation locations."

Alongside efforts to secure energy, AWS is also exploring ways to improve power efficiency. To respond to the spread of artificial intelligence (AI), it announced new technologies last year for power, cooling, and hardware design to be applied in data centers.

He explained, "The new design improves computing performance by 12% compared to existing designs, reducing the number of data centers needed to provide the same capacity, and through a more efficient cooling system, mechanical energy consumption can be reduced by up to 46%."

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