On September 21, the European Commission unveiled a continent-wide rating system for data centers, ranking them on two key metrics: energy efficiency and water usage. Each metric gets its own grade, from A (top) to G (bottom).

How the Digital Labeling Works

This new system doesn't require centers to start reporting energy use from scratch. Since 2024, any data center in the EU with at least 500 kW of installed IT capacity has already been required to submit operational data to a central EU database. The regulation pulls from this info and generates digital labels automatically, letting anyone compare centers on a single, unified scale.

What Gets Rated

The label highlights two factors: how efficiently a center uses electricity and how efficiently it uses water. Each gets its own grade—from A (the best on the scale) down to G.