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Energy Company Trials Computer Servers To Heat Homes

Posted by Soulskill on from the turn-the-thermostat-to-'crysis' dept.

New submitter MarcAuslander sends this Associated Press report: Eneco, a Dutch-based energy company with more than 2 million customers, said Tuesday it is installing 'e-Radiators' — computer servers that generate heat while crunching numbers — in five homes across the Netherlands in a trial to see if their warmth could be a commercially viable alternative for traditional radiators. The technology is the brainchild of the Dutch startup company Nerdalize, whose founders claim to have developed the idea after huddling near a laptop to keep warm after their home's thermostat broke and jokingly suggesting buying 100 laptops. Nerdalize says its e-Radiators offer companies or research institutes a cheaper alternative to housing servers in data centers. And because Nerdalize foots the power bill for the radiators, Eneco customers get the warmth they generate for free. The companies said the environment wins, too, because energy is effectively used twice in the new system - to power the servers and to heat rooms.

6 of 160 comments (clear)

  1. Just imagine the tech support calls by Shoten · · Score: 3, Funny

    "What do you mean, you can't come out to fix my hard drive until next week? Don't you know how cold it is outside?!?!?"

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  2. Want to know what I think? by eyenot · · Score: 1, Funny

    I think this idea sounds like a bunch of ...
    *takes of glasses* ... hot air.
    * YAAAAGGGGHHHHHHHH *

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    "Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
  3. Re:PS3 as prior art by ArcadeMan · · Score: 4, Funny

    We always knew the PS3 wasn't cool.

    Signed, Nintendo and/or Microsoft fanboys.

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  4. Re:Great idea... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    In summer, you only crunch negative numbers, obviously...

  5. The new thermostat settings by SuperKendall · · Score: 5, Funny

    A dial on the side of the server ranging from:

    1) Allow Single thread only
    2) Allow Multiple Threads
    3) Allow Multiple Cores
    4) Enable GPU Access
    5) Start Java processes
    6) Disable port blocking
    7) Run NortonAV
    8) Run Chrome
    9) Compile complex C++ Template-base Project
    10) Enable Adobe Updater

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  6. Atonement by SuperKendall · · Score: 5, Funny

    Seriously, what kind of a /.er uses unbalanced parentheses for lists?

    Atonement for years of unfinished LISP programs.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley