Bridge Data Centres, EcoCeres complete inaugural HVO-powered backup-fuel pilot for data centers in Asia Pacific

Bridge Data Centres, a Singapore-headquartered hyperscale data-center provider, announced May 12 that it and biofuel producer EcoCeres have successfully completed their inaugural backup-fuel pilot using hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO), also known as renewable diesel, in Asia Pacific at BDC’s data-center campuses.

HVO requires no modifications to existing backup generators and reduces greenhouse-gas emissions by up to 90 percent.

The pilot covered the full range of emergency backup-power scenarios, including generator startup, load transfer and sustained operations under data-center conditions, with all performance and emissions targets met.

In addition, BDC has completed large-scale HVO testing across multiple locations.

Building on the success of the pilot, BDC said it intends to further deploy HVO-powered solutions across its data-center campus in Asia Pacific and beyond.

“Sustainability is core to BDC’s strategy,” said Eric Fan, the CEO of Bridge Data Centres. “As artificial-intelligence (AI) workloads continue to scale across the region, we are committed to advancing innovative clean-energy solutions that reduce our carbon footprint while meeting the performance and reliability requirements of our hyperscale customers. The success of our inaugural pilot in Asia Pacific demonstrates that HVO-powered backup fuel is a feasible and replicable concept for other high-growth data-center markets.”

Matti Lievonen, CEO of EcoCeres, added, “Decarbonizing data centers is one of the most urgent and technically demanding challenges in the net-zero transition, and we are proud to partner with Bridge Data Centres to demonstrate that HVO is ready to perform at scale in real-world operations. By proving that waste-based renewable fuels can meet stringent reliability and performance requirements in existing diesel backup systems, this pilot offers a practical way for operators to significantly reduce emissions while maintaining the highest standards of reliability.”

The milestone comes after BDC and EcoCeres signed a memorandum of understanding to jointly pilot and promote HVO adoption in data-center operations.

BDC and EcoCeres will collaborate further to develop common standards and practical guidelines to support broader HVO adoption across the data-center industry.

The partnership is part of BDC’s wider push to advance clean-energy solutions for data centers, which includes developing Singapore’s first floating hydrogen power-generation solution tailored for next-gen AI data centers.