In the “Sustainability & Green Data Centers” category, firstcolo prevails with its blueprint project FRA7, a sustainable, AI-ready data center being built in Rosbach vor der Höhe.
Frankfurt/Main, September 2025. As part of the German Datacenter Talents & Impact Awards, the German Datacenter Association (GDA) honors innovative projects, companies, and institutions that actively contribute to shaping the data center industry. The GDA recognizes outstanding achievements as well as cross-industry and interdisciplinary collaborations in five categories. This year’s winner in the “Sustainability & Green Data Centers” category is firstcolo GmbH – with the blueprint project FRA7 for a sustainable, AI-ready data center in Rosbach vor der Höhe.
“We are very pleased about the recognition and the award. With FRA7, we want to seamlessly continue our chosen path of sustainable and competitive data centers,” says Jerome Evans, founder and Chief Executive Officer of firstcolo GmbH.
“The ICT industry is already responsible for around two percent of global CO₂ emissions, with data centers accounting for a large part of this footprint. Due to growing data volumes, rapidly increasing energy demand, and the fundamental requirement for climate protection, a radical rethinking has taken place in the industry. With FRA7, we are setting an example for the compatibility of high performance, sustainability, and data sovereignty.”
Important criteria for the award in this category include the reduction of energy and resource consumption contributed, as well as the holistic approach of the concept through the presence of an overarching sustainability strategy. The degree of innovation, scalability, and transferability to other projects also play a decisive role.
firstcolo was able to prevail here. “The path to FRA7 began with the clear strategic vision of realizing the new data center as a technical flagship project and an ecological role model,” Evans recalls. The concept combines forward-looking cooling technologies with a modular, scalable architecture for high-density and AI workloads, enabling a Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) target value of less than 1.2.
“High-density liquid cooling shows us the way to the future: it lowers PUE values more than air cooling ever could and delivers the necessary efficiency. Operations are carried out with certified green electricity, and waste heat is fed into the municipal heating network. Recyclable materials are also used in construction,” he adds.
As a dynamic infrastructure, FRA7 will continuously evolve in the coming years with new technical possibilities and constant efficiency values. “The relevance of the project extends beyond the location and serves as an example that high-performance data centers can be operated sustainably and integrated into municipal energy and heating systems,” Evans concludes.
As an operator of data centers in Germany, firstcolo GmbH, based in Frankfurt am Main, provides its customers with the highest level of service quality. firstcolo’s range of services includes classic colocation and the rental of server systems, as well as managed services, security solutions, and cloud services.
