Chemical research clearinghouse was big data before big data

摘要

Before there was Google, Amazon or even an internet, there was big data in what may seem an unlikely place: a chemical research clearinghouse in the heart of the American Midwest. For more than a century, Chemical Abstracts Service in Columbus, Ohio, has been gathering and summarizing chemical research breakthroughs from around the globe and then sharing them with researchers, technology developers and businesses. Its abstracts represent the bulk of humanity's chemical discoveries. Once the abstracts moved from fat paper volumes onto computer servers, that work required a lot of electricity. So along the way, the center became an early adopter of energy efficiency technologies to help rein in the power demands of a fast-growing sector that environmentalists have warned represents a looming climate change threat. "Data centers are the biggest drivers of new demand in the U.S. currently, and one of the biggest in the world, simply because it's going so fast," said Gary Cook, director of Greenpeace's Rethink IT campaign, which has been pressuring major data companies for a decade to reduce the use of coal-fired power. Kris Woods, Chemical Abstracts Service's director of technology infrastructure, said the nonprofit's awardwinning energy efficiency conversion in 2014 helped the center save money, was in keeping with its mission and was better for the environment.