A battery installed at a Google data centre in Belgium will help it decarbonise its operations.

Centrica Business Solutions has announced a new collaboration with energy storage provider Fluence to supply and optimise a 2.75MW energy storage system.

It will be the first time for the tech giant to use battery-based energy storage technology to reduce its use of diesel generators needed to provide backup power to the facility.

It forms part of Google’s commitment to operating globally on 24/7 carbon-free energy by 2030.

Marc Oman, Senior Lead of Data Centre Energy and Infrastructure at Google, commented: “Not only will it allow Google to operate more cleanly during interruptions to grid reliability but through our collaboration with Centrica, our battery will help the Belgian electricity grid maintain its target frequency and stay in balance.”

“There are an estimated 20GW of backup diesel generators in service across the data centre industry, representing a massive opportunity to deploy cleaner solutions,” said Arno Van Mourik, Director of Centrica Business Solutions International.