From the outside, a data centre appears almost lifeless.
Yet within its walls, thousands of servers hum relentlessly, consuming vast amounts of power, writes Gerhard Fourie, channel aales manager for Sub-Saharan Africa and IOI at Nutanix.
Every mobile transaction, streaming session, or banking query from Cape Town to Cairo depends on this invisible engine.
The true cost of computing has long been measured in rands, shillings, and naira. But a new currency is now reshaping boardroom decisions: carbon.
In markets where digital transformation and workload modernisation is racing ahead, the unseen emissions attached to every workload are becoming a strategic concern.
For CIOs across Africa, the challenge is clear. How do you continue to expand access to cloud and digital services while balancing sustainability obligations and tightening regulations?
Digital infrastructure leaves a footprint
It is easy to imagine digital services as clean and intangible. Yet servers consume electricity, and electricity production in much of Africa still relies heavily on fossil fuels.
This makes data centres a significant contributor to carbon output, even as they enable the very innovations driving economic growth.
In South Africa, data centres are among the fastest-growing consumers of electricity, with the majority still powered by coal-based energy. Teraco’s 2024 Sustainability Report notes that data centre energy demand continues to climb, even as operators pursue renewable offsets and improved efficiency.
The country’s carbon tax, introduced in 2019 and now priced at R190 per tonne of CO₂, further underlines the financial incentive for organisations to reduce their emissions footprint.
Global research suggests that energy demand from data centres could rise dramatically by the end of the decade.
For African nations that are already battling power constraints, this raises important questions. How do organisations scale their digital ecosystems without deepening the continent’s energy challenges?
Emissions are not fixed
The critical insight for African CIOs is that emissions are not inevitable. The same workload can generate very different levels of carbon depending on where it runs, how infrastructure is managed, and the energy mix of the grid powering it.
In regions where renewables are expanding, such as South Africa’s Western and Northern Cape provinces, Kenya, and Morocco, shifting workloads to cleaner grids can reduce emissions significantly.
This does not require a complete redesign of applications. With the right strategy and tools, CIOs can cut emissions while maintaining availability and performance.
Cloud choices matter
Cloud adoption in Africa is accelerating, from hyperscaler regions opening in Johannesburg and Nairobi to local providers offering colocation facilities.
Yet not all clouds are equal when it comes to sustainability. Large public cloud providers often benefit from economies of scale and more efficient cooling, which can lower operational emissions.
However, the trade-off is visibility. CIOs may lose direct oversight of energy sourcing and reporting. Local colocation or on-premises facilities, while sometimes less efficient, can offer better accountability and control.
The decision is not straightforward. It requires balancing cost, compliance, performance, and environmental impact.
The rise of embodied emissions
As African nations gradually green their grids, operational emissions will fall. But that shifts attention to embodied emissions: the carbon produced when servers and networking equipment are manufactured, shipped, and installed. These emissions can account for half of an asset’s lifecycle footprint.
For CIOs, this means refresh cycles are not just financial decisions but environmental ones. Extending the life of existing equipment reduces embodied carbon, yet must be weighed against the efficiency gains of newer technology.
Across Africa, where budgets are often stretched, this conversation is especially relevant. Sweating assets for longer may deliver both financial and sustainability benefits, provided risks are managed carefully.
Visibility unlocks action
You cannot reduce what you cannot measure. Visibility into workload placement, energy use, and emissions intensity is the starting point. While measurement methodologies are evolving, estimation is far better than assumption.
Tools that model energy and emissions allow CIOs to make data-driven decisions about infrastructure strategy.
For example, moving workloads from coal-heavy grids to regions with cleaner mixes or consolidating underused resources can be quantified and tracked.
This creates credible reporting for ESG obligations and demonstrates tangible progress to boards, investors, and regulators.
Sustainability as strategy
In South Africa, sustainability is not just a regulatory issue – it’s a boardroom one. Rising energy costs, the threat of blackouts, and carbon taxes are forcing CIOs to rethink where and how their workloads run.
In Africa, sustainability is often framed as a social or environmental imperative. But it is also becoming a commercial one. Customers, investors, and governments are beginning to demand clearer accountability for emissions.
Regulations such as South Africa’s carbon tax and similar frameworks under discussion elsewhere are sharpening the focus.
CIOs, therefore, need to view sustainability as a core business requirement. The infrastructure choices made today will shape not only operational resilience but also an organisation’s ability to compete in markets where sustainability credentials are increasingly valued.
The leadership opportunity
South Africa’s data centre landscape is maturing fast, with hyperscaler regions and colocation providers investing heavily.
This presents both a challenge and an opportunity to build a low-carbon foundation for Africa’s broader digital economy.
CIOs in Africa have a unique chance to lead. The continent is building much of its digital infrastructure from a younger base than Europe or North America. This presents the opportunity to leapfrog into more sustainable models rather than retrofitting outdated ones.
By embedding carbon awareness into workload placement, cloud strategy and refresh cycles, African CIOs can align IT with broader climate and development goals. They can also demonstrate that growth and sustainability are not opposing forces, but complementary ones.
Every workload counts
Africa’s digital growth story is only just beginning. The continent’s expanding mobile economy, fintech innovation, and smart city projects will all depend on compute power. Each of those workloads carries a hidden carbon cost.
The path to net zero will not be won through sweeping gestures alone. It will be shaped by thousands of small, strategic decisions, such as where to run workloads, when to replace hardware, and how to consolidate resources. These may not make headlines, but they will make a measurable difference.
For CIOs, the message is that every digital decision is also an environmental one. By recognising this and acting on it, Africa’s technology leaders can ensure the continent’s digital future is fast, resilient, and sustainable.