The data storage industry has provided billions of terabytes of hard drive capacity to its customers over the years. Meanwhile, demand for HDDs and SSDs continues to grow rapidly, which also increases the potential for e-waste. Many hard drives reach the end of their life each year – about 22 million hard drives in North America alone. It is estimated that about half of the decommissioned hard drives in the EU are destroyed, which obviously creates a significant amount of waste. This waste includes valuable materials such as gold, silver, copper, aluminum and cobalt. If we do not recycle these materials, they will be permanently lost.

Therefore, there is a need across the industry for a sustainable solution based on the principle of the circular economy. However, electronic storage media poses a challenge due to the data they contain. This data must remain protected even at the end of a hard drive’s life – in line with data protection laws and rules on the protection of intellectual property.

Delete data securely

Should storage devices be automatically destroyed at the end of their lifespan? No, because there are safe methods for deleting data without destroying the drive itself and creating electronic waste. Even the failure of a hard drive does not bring certainty. Even the smallest 2x2mm particles can still contain large amounts of data.

As part of data protection, we therefore rely on data deletion solutions. These solutions range from self-encrypting drives to Instant Secure Erase (ISE) functions. Both methods allow us to clean and restart hard drives. New standards such as IEEE 2883 also offer specific guidelines for securely deleting data on various storage media. For companies that cannot delete their data themselves, we recommend working with certified service providers.

Extend the lifespan

In the context of sustainability, it is important that we extend the lifespan of products. Better design combined with smarter production processes not only reduces CO2 emissions and raw material consumption, but also opens the door to a circular economy. When you know that re-evaluating hard drives saves 275 times more CO2 than recycling, the importance of this fact becomes immediately clear.

In the context of sustainability, it is important that we extend the lifespan of products.

Vincent Oostlander, Director of Seagate Solutions and EMEA Sales, Seagate Technology.

When designing products, we therefore pay attention to modular components, the use of recyclable materials and easy disassembly and remanufacturing. The aim is to create a closed material loop that allows complete recycling with minimal energy consumption. In this way, we want to prevent downcycling – a recycling practice in which the new product has a lower value than the original. To achieve this, it is important that manufacturers work closely with their suppliers.

Partnerships in a circular economy

Collaboration between storage solution manufacturers and industry partners and supply chains often provides the right breeding ground for the reuse, repair or sale of parts and materials in the production of HDDs and SSDs. In addition, the expertise and networks of industry associations such as the Circular Drive Initiative (CDI) are essential resources. The CDI works with leading companies in areas such as digital storage, sustainability and blockchain. For example, the aim is to reduce the mountain of electronic waste by safely reusing storage hardware.

What can a storage manufacturer do to enable a circular economy at scale? Actions include recovering used drives, implementing secure processes to erase data on drives, and then reusing those drives. Components and materials from old drives can also be reused. In fiscal year 2023, Seagate extended the life of 1.19 million hard drives and SSDs through refurbishment and reuse, eliminating approximately 553 tons of e-waste.

More capacity, same space requirement

The circular economy offers an answer not only to CO2 emissions and energy consumption, but also to the protection of critical raw materials, financial savings, etc. In storage, for example, there is great potential in innovations that expand the capacity of hard drives – such as Heat Seagate’s HAMR (Assisted Magnetic Recording) technology.

A new hard drive with a capacity of 32 TB has a similar carbon footprint to one with only 20 TB of storage. By storing more data on a hard drive while using similar amounts of energy, companies can store their data more sustainably and cost-efficiently. In data centers, this also limits indirect energy costs for cooling.

Profit and reputation

Of course, profitability is also important in the context of the circular economy. In any case, it has been proven that compliance with ESG rules (Environmental, Social & Governance) as a framework for the circular economy usually leads to higher rather than lower sales – and thus contributes to the success of companies. Lower use of critical raw materials in production and lower energy consumption have a positive effect on finances and the environment. It is therefore important to combine the two sensibly.

Being a leader in sustainability may temporarily lose ground to the competition. But committing environmental violations can scare off stakeholders and even face fines or sanctions. That’s why it’s important to find a good balance. And the latter is the responsibility of company management. Their job is to analyze companies’ ESG investments and results. Transparent and honest reporting is essential, among other things to avoid being labeled “greenwashing.” Don’t forget to include your supply chain in these efforts.

The European Commission expects data centers to be carbon neutral by 2030. The introduction of a circular data storage system will therefore make an important contribution to sustainability and help companies protect their profitability and reputation.

This is a contribution from Vincent Oostlander, Director Seagate Solutions and EMEA Sales at Seagate Technology.