Data centers are increasingly becoming the nerve centers of business and society, creating a growing need to produce the most computing power per square foot at the lowest possible cost in energy and resources.

One of Microsoft’s data centers is a 500,000-square-foot facility that was built on a bean field in Quincy, Wash., in 2006

Though the company hesitates to detail the capabilities of its data centers, the one in Quincy can store up to 6.75 trillion photos

NJ2, a data center located in Weehawken, N.J., houses the trading engines of several large financial exchanges. Clients keep their servers in secure cages

Data centers run enormously scaled software applications with millions of users. The number of servers in the United States nearly quintupled from 1997 to 2007

An emergency shut down switch in a server room at the Quincy facility

As servers become more powerful, more kilowatts are needed to run and cool them

Data centers worldwide now consume more energy annually than Sweden