3. Definitions
Key terms used throughout the methodology.
Accelerator. A specialised processor attached to a compute instance for parallel workloads, most commonly a graphics processing unit.
Amortisation. The division of a fixed quantity of emissions across the operating hours of the hardware that produced them.
Chip Vendor. The company that designs and sells a processor, an accelerator, a memory part, or a NAND flash part. Distinct from the cloud provider that buys the part and installs it in a server.
Cloud Provider. A company that offers cloud computing services and solutions to businesses and individuals. In this methodology, the term refers to AWS, Azure, and GCP.
CO₂e. Carbon dioxide equivalent. A metric that expresses the global warming potential of various greenhouse gases as the equivalent amount of carbon dioxide.
Cradle-to-Gate. The scope of a life cycle assessment covering raw material extraction through manufacture, ending at the point the finished product leaves the factory, and excluding transport to the customer, use, and end of life.
Cradle-to-Grave. The scope of a life cycle assessment covering every stage of a product's life, being raw material extraction, manufacture, transport, use, and end of life.
Data Centre. A facility composed of networked computers and storage used to process, store, and distribute data.
Data Centre Shell. The building that houses the IT equipment of a data centre, together with its fixed structure and the systems installed to support it.
Die. In semiconductor manufacturing, a small block of semiconducting material on which a functional circuit is fabricated.
Die Area. The surface area of the silicon in a finished package, expressed in square millimetres.
Die Density. The storage capacity a given area of memory or NAND flash die holds. It differs between the generations of each.
Embodied Emissions. The greenhouse gas emissions associated with the manufacturing and transport of physical server components, together with estimated allowances for end-of-life processing and for the data centre shell.
Emissions. The discharge of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, expressed in CO₂e.
End of Life. The treatment of hardware after it is withdrawn from service, covering collection, processing, material recovery, and disposal.
GHG. Greenhouse gases. Gases that trap heat in the atmosphere and contribute to the greenhouse effect and global warming.
Instance. In cloud computing, a virtual server used for running applications on the cloud.
LCA. Life Cycle Assessment. A method for assessing the environmental impacts associated with all stages of a product's life, from raw material extraction through manufacturing, use, and end of life.
NAND Flash. The non-volatile memory technology used in solid state drives, manufactured as a stack of storage layers on a single die.
Process Node. The semiconductor manufacturing generation a die is fabricated on, expressed in nanometres.
Recycled Content Method. The end-of-life accounting method of the GHG Protocol Product Life Cycle Accounting and Reporting Standard, under which a product is credited for the recycled material it is made from and not for the material recovered from it after use.
Semiconductor. A material with controllable electrical conductivity used in creating electronic components such as transistors and integrated circuits in computer hardware.
Server. A computer or system that provides resources, data, services, or programs to other computers over a network.
SKU. Stock Keeping Unit. In cloud billing, a distinct combination of service, resource type, region, and pricing tier that appears as a line item on a cloud usage report.
Thermal Design Power. The heat output a manufacturer specifies a cooling solution must dissipate for a processor or an accelerator, expressed in watts.
vCPU. Virtual central processing unit. The standard unit of compute capacity allocated to a cloud instance, representing a share of a physical processor core.