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DataBank Aligns Engineering Bonuses with Energy Targets to Unlock $800k in Annual Savings
DataBank, a data center owner and operator, has successfully bypassed the traditional friction between sustainability goals and facility operations by implementing a dual-incentive structure that rewards both individual employees and the company’s bottom line for hitting energy efficiency targets. This operating shift moved decarbonization from a secondary "sustainability" goal to a primary financial driver, resulting in eight large-scale efficiency projects that saved over 8 gigawatt hours (GWh) and $800,000 in annual energy costs. These efficiency projects were supported by Mantis Innovation, a decarbonization consultant, and ranged from cooling airflow optimization to LED lighting retrofits.
At the individual level, DataBank tied energy efficiency KPIs directly to the annual bonuses and compensation of its Operations, Infrastructure, and Engineering teams. By moving beyond sustainability-only departments, the company ensured that the technical staff managing the equipment are financially motivated to move past the "status quo" of facility operations. “We tied our goals back to our own bonuses... everyone has meat in the game when it comes to these efficiency projects,” explained Jenny Gerson, Sustainability lead at DataBank.
Complementing these individual rewards is a corporate-level incentive rooted in the data center's co-location business model. While DataBank’s tenants are responsible for the cost of the energy they consume, DataBank holds the primary utility account and bills the tenants using a "PUE multiplier" to cover facility overhead like cooling and lighting. The company’s Service Level Agreements (SLAs) set specific Power Utilization Effectiveness (PUE) targets; if the facility operates inefficiently and exceeds the SLA’s PUE limit, DataBank cannot charge the customer for that extra power and must absorb the cost itself. Conversely, if DataBank manages the facility more efficiently than the target, the difference between the actual energy cost and the tenant's multiplier payment becomes direct profit. As Jenny Gerson noted, “In our SLA, we’ll often have a certain PUE that we have to stick to... if we do better than that PUE, that's money in our pocket”.
Together, these two mechanisms create a rare alignment where technical risk-taking for the sake of efficiency is rewarded at every level of the organization. By ensuring that both the individuals on the ground and the company as a whole benefit financially from lower energy intensity, DataBank has turned PUE reduction into a standardized, high-performance business practice that naturally accelerates its sustainability goals.
Watch the full recording → https://www.nexuslabs.online/content/how-databank-is-making-data-center-decarbonization-pay-without-compromising-uptime
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DataBank, a data center owner and operator, has successfully bypassed the traditional friction between sustainability goals and facility operations by implementing a dual-incentive structure that rewards both individual employees and the company’s bottom line for hitting energy efficiency targets. This operating shift moved decarbonization from a secondary "sustainability" goal to a primary financial driver, resulting in eight large-scale efficiency projects that saved over 8 gigawatt hours (GWh) and $800,000 in annual energy costs. These efficiency projects were supported by Mantis Innovation, a decarbonization consultant, and ranged from cooling airflow optimization to LED lighting retrofits.
At the individual level, DataBank tied energy efficiency KPIs directly to the annual bonuses and compensation of its Operations, Infrastructure, and Engineering teams. By moving beyond sustainability-only departments, the company ensured that the technical staff managing the equipment are financially motivated to move past the "status quo" of facility operations. “We tied our goals back to our own bonuses... everyone has meat in the game when it comes to these efficiency projects,” explained Jenny Gerson, Sustainability lead at DataBank.
Complementing these individual rewards is a corporate-level incentive rooted in the data center's co-location business model. While DataBank’s tenants are responsible for the cost of the energy they consume, DataBank holds the primary utility account and bills the tenants using a "PUE multiplier" to cover facility overhead like cooling and lighting. The company’s Service Level Agreements (SLAs) set specific Power Utilization Effectiveness (PUE) targets; if the facility operates inefficiently and exceeds the SLA’s PUE limit, DataBank cannot charge the customer for that extra power and must absorb the cost itself. Conversely, if DataBank manages the facility more efficiently than the target, the difference between the actual energy cost and the tenant's multiplier payment becomes direct profit. As Jenny Gerson noted, “In our SLA, we’ll often have a certain PUE that we have to stick to... if we do better than that PUE, that's money in our pocket”.
Together, these two mechanisms create a rare alignment where technical risk-taking for the sake of efficiency is rewarded at every level of the organization. By ensuring that both the individuals on the ground and the company as a whole benefit financially from lower energy intensity, DataBank has turned PUE reduction into a standardized, high-performance business practice that naturally accelerates its sustainability goals.
Watch the full recording → https://www.nexuslabs.online/content/how-databank-is-making-data-center-decarbonization-pay-without-compromising-uptime
Sign up for the newsletter to get 5 stories like this per week
This is a great piece!
I agree.