4.10 Consider CDNs and Edge Caching
Edge caching and CDN delivery can help optimize the sustainable delivery of digital services by optimizing how your website’s traffic is transferred over the internet.
Criteria
- Content Delivery Networks (CDNs): When building for a globally distributed audience, use a CDN to store and serve simple read-only, pre-generated resources in a fast and efficient manner. Although they definitely can increase performance, it is also another layer of infrastructure that needs to be considered for sustainability.
- Sustainability Commitment: Verify that the CDN provides a commitment to sustainability.
- Local Servers: A hosting provider was chosen with servers located close to the visitor.
- Avoid Caching Inappropriate Resources: Don’t use the service to host dynamic resources or JavaScript (unless through a first-party host) as due to cache partitioning, cross-origin resource sharing (CORS), and other browser mechanics, any benefits are negated by weaker performance, the inability to cache or interact, and the potential introduction of security and privacy issues to be introduced. This doesn’t affect JSON or other static assets.
- Process Data Close to the Source: All information passed between the layers of an application incurs a cost, both in terms of data transferred, and CPU cycles for (de)serialization. Wherever possible, data transformations must be performed close to the source to reduce these costs and avoid processing data that will later be discarded.
Impact
Medium
Effort
Low
Benefits
- Environmental:
Reduces the amount of time spent in front of the device as the delivery of assets can occur quicker (due to servers being closer to the device), which in turn will drain the consumers’ device battery-less. - Social Equity:
Benefits visitors in normally underserved geographies and economies, or from disadvantaged backgrounds, as content may be available in a region closer to their location. - Performance:
Visitors experience less latency due to the distance between them and the server is reduced. - Economic:
Content delivery networks work on economies of scale, and their data transfer rates are often cheaper than those of many hosting providers.
GRI
- materials: Low
- energy: Medium
- water: Low
- emissions: Medium
Example
- A hosting provider speed and performance statistics tool.
Resources
- AWS WAF: SUS01-BP01 – Choose Region based on both business requirements and sustainability goals
- AWS WAF: SUS02-BP04 – Optimize geographic placement of workloads based on their networking requirements
- Carbon Aware Computing: Next Green Breakthrough or New Greenwashing?
- CDN Compare
- Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS)
- Edge computing
- Energy Consumption in Data Centres and Broadband Communication Networks in the EU
- Energy-efficient Cloud Computing Technologies and Policies for an Eco-friendly Cloud Market
- Future trends of Green All Optical Networks and ICT Infrastructure in a large context
- Gaining security and privacy by partitioning the cache
- [GPFEDS] 2.3 – Specifications (Connection Issues) (PDF)
- [GPFEDS] 6.2 – Front-End (Caching Mechanisms) (PDF)
- [GPFEDS] 6.7 – Front-End (Server Host) (PDF)
- [GPFEDS] 7.1 – Back-End (Reusability Caching) (PDF)
- [GPFEDS] 8.1 – Hosting (Hosting Provider) (PDF)
- [GPFEDS] 8.5 – Hosting (Renewable Documentation) (PDF)
- [GPFEDS] 8.6 – Hosting (Local Datacenters) (PDF)
- Greenhouse Gas Protocol – Cloud & Data Center Services (PDF)
- [GR491] 1-8003 – Datacenter Location
- [GR491] 2-8020 – Datacenter Hub
- Green Data Streams
- High Performance MySQL: Query Performance Optimization
- How Clean is Your Cloud? (PDF)
- How green data centers can cut your carbon footprint
- How using a CDN is better for people and the planet
- Investigating the Inconsistencies among Energy and Energy Intensity Estimates of the Internet
- Is My Host Fast Yet?
- Measuring the Emissions & Energy Footprint of the ICT Sector
- Microsoft Azure WAF: Deploy to low-carbon regions
- MySQL Has Functions (Part 5) : PHP vs MySQL Performance
- Microsoft Emissions Impact Dashboard
- Public CDNs Are Useless and Dangerous
- Reporting requirements on the energy performance and sustainability of data centres for the Energy Efficiency Directive
- Subresource Integrity
- The Hosting Server Location & What It Means For Website SEO
- United Nations [SDGS] Goal 3 (Health & Well-being)
- United Nations [SDGS] Goal 6 (Water & Sanitation)
- United Nations [SDGS] Goal 7 (Sustainable Energy)
- United Nations [SDGS] Goal 9 (Infrastructure)
- United Nations [SDGS] Goal 12 (Consumption & Production)
- United Nations [SDGS] Goal 13 (Climate Change)
- What are dual-use data centers and how they drive energy efficiency
- What is a Content Delivery Network – A Beginner’s Guide