Energy-Aware Massively Distributed Cloud Facilities: The DISCOVERY Initiative

Instead of the current trend consisting of building larger and larger data centers (DCs) in few strategic locations, the DISCOVERY initiative proposes to leverage any network point of presences (PoP, i.e., a small or medium-sized network center) available through the Internet. The key idea is to demonstrate a widely distributed Cloud platform that can better match the geographical dispersal of users and of renewable energy sources. This involves radical changes in the way resources are managed, but leveraging computing resources around the end-users will enable to deliver a new generation of highly efficient and sustainable Utility Computing (UC) platforms, thus providing a strong alternative to the actual Cloud model based on mega DCs (i.e., DCs composed of tens of thousands resources). This poster will present the DISCOVERY initiative efforts towards achieving energy-aware massively distributed cloud facilities.