Terrence and Lesley Bridges, a couple in Essex, England, have become the first residents in the UK to heat their homes through a small data center. They are involved in a pilot project targeting low-income households aimed at achieving a zero-carbon transition. Installed in a garden shed and powered by a cluster of 56 Raspberry Pi motherboards, the system has cut home heating bills from £375 (approximately $492) per month to just £40 (approximately $52).
According to the BBC, the HeatHub system developed by Thermify is part of the SHIELD project of UK Power Networks. Although the Raspberry Pi motherboard in the system cannot run complex AI models (independent of NVIDIA GPU), it can provide computing power for applications or process large batches of data. Travis Theune, co-founder and CEO of Thermify, said that this system will be integrated into a distributed remote data center network in the future to provide data processing services to customers, and customers will pay computing power usage fees on demand. This service is currently in the pilot phase.
Theune also says the home is heated by transferring the heat generated by servers processing data to the hot water system in Bridges' home, which is both environmentally friendly and cost-effective. Thanks to the installation of the new system, the Bridges family's home energy bill has been reduced by nearly 90%.
The system is especially important for Leslie, who has spinal stenosis and is prone to severe pain in cold weather.
Although it sounds tempting and promises to significantly reduce bills, this kind of data center heating is not a safe and low-cost DIY implementation for ordinary households. The pilot project uses servers managed by a professional team, a formal heat exchange system, controlled ventilation, and a commercial electricity bill settlement system: the electricity bill is usually borne by the operator rather than the owner. If an individual were to set up a similar setup at home, the electricity bill required to run a power-hungry computer could far exceed the savings in heating expenses. In addition, relevant legal, insurance, building permit and compensation risks need to be carefully evaluated - if personal modifications cause fire, water vapor damage or equipment failure, insurance companies are likely to deny compensation.
In actual operation, the electrical load is an issue that must be carefully considered. The rated current of the main fuse in an average British home is 60 to 100 amps. The power of a server rack can easily reach several thousand watts. Even if only a few high-performance devices are running, the power supply limit of the home may be approached. If a circuit is overloaded, improperly wired, or if multiple high-power devices are running on the same circuit at the same time, it can cause overheating of cables, tripped circuit breakers, and even fire hazards. The projects in the pilot project have undergone professional electrical design and safety acceptance, which is difficult for ordinary families to do.
There have been previous cases in the UK of using data center waste heat to achieve practical energy recovery. For example, in 2023, a public swimming pool in the UK installed a data center similar to the size of a washing machine. The system provides constant temperature heat energy to the swimming pool 60% of the time, keeping the pool water temperature at about 30°C.