GoI eases sustainability requirements for AI GPU tenders after pushback from data centre operators.
The Indian government has eased its sustainability requirements for the Rs 10,000-crore graphics processing unit (GPU) tender under the IndiaAI Mission.
The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) has responded to pressure from data centre operators by removing the power usage effectiveness (PUE) requirement as a strict eligibility criterion, as per a report by The Economic Times.
Initially, the tender mandated a PUE of less than 1.35 for data centres to qualify, a measure that sparked objections from industry players who argued that meeting this threshold was nearly impossible under current conditions. The PUE metric gauges energy efficiency by comparing the total energy consumed by a data centre to the energy used solely by its computing equipment, with lower PUE numbers reflecting better efficiency.
Many Indian data centres, traditionally built with PUE values ranging from 1.4 to 1.7, were facing difficulties in complying with this requirement. This challenge was especially pronounced due to India’s high ambient temperatures, which complicate the use of cooling technologies like direct-to-chip cooling. While building new facilities specifically designed for AI might achieve such efficiency, retrofitting existing infrastructure would be both costly and time-consuming.
The government’s revised criteria will now award points based on PUE efficiency: data centres with a PUE below 1.2 will earn 10 marks, while those between 1.2 and 1.3 will receive 7.5 marks. This change allows operators more flexibility and is a relief for many in the industry who feared being priced out by costly upgrades.
The tender, aimed at establishing a large-scale public AI cloud infrastructure of at least 10,000 GPUs through a public-private partnership, is a pivotal part of India’s ambitious IndiaAI Mission. Following the change, MeitY has extended the bid submission deadline from November 12 to November 28, marking the third postponement since the original September 6 deadline. Previous extensions were granted to accommodate feedback from the industry and to refine the terms to be more achievable.
Data centre operators had argued that requiring such stringent PUE compliance would necessitate substantial capital expenditure, which would ultimately be passed down to customers. In countries like Singapore, similar energy concerns had led to a temporary halt in data centre development when power consumption hit 7 per cent of the country’s total. While global data centres are reported to consume about 3 per cent of total energy production, the share in India remains relatively modest, at approximately 0.2 per cent-0.3 per cent.
AI workloads are exceptionally power-hungry, with typical data centre racks consuming 6 KW of power but rising to 100 KW per rack for AI-specific applications. He added that while energy concerns are legitimate on a global scale, India’s growing use of green energy keeps the current level of data centre consumption manageable.
The relaxation of the PUE requirement could pave the way for more competitive bids and faster progress toward India’s AI goals.
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GoI eases sustainability requirements for AI GPU tenders after pushback from data centre operators. source
