Selective power cuts – Scaleway’s strategy in case of power outages

In anticipation of potential peak loads on the power grid this winter, the French government is considering implementing selective power cuts across mainland France in order to avoid overloading the power supply.

These power cuts, mandated by the French electricity transmission network operator (RTE) and operated by Enedis, may occur during the following time slots – 8am-1pm and 6pm-8pm – for around two hours, and no more than twice a day within the same area.

Power grid operators will notify users of the risk of power cuts three days in advance via the mobile application Ecowatt (and on this website) The affected areas and time slots are confirmed by Enedis at 5pm, the day before the outage.

• Scaleway’s data centers are equipped to run autonomously under any circumstances.
• In the event of a power outage, the data centers are powered by diesel generators until the national grid is back in operation (Enedis/RTE).
• As a result, Scaleway’s data centers keep running as usual, even if a selective power cut is implemented in the area.
  
  

Scaleway is the only data center operator in France to implement deliberate curtailment several times a year. This measure, which is taken at the request of electricity operators (Enedis/RTE) to reduce the load on the power grid during peak periods. Electricity curtailment in data centers and regional selective power cuts both require great organizational and operational rigor, which means that our experience with electricity curtailment has fully prepared us for this winter’s potential power cuts.


The limits of Scaleway’s liability

Scaleway is liable within the limits of the services it is responsible for managing, i.e. the physical protection of its sites, and both protecting and maintaining the operational status of its underlying infrastructure. Clients remain responsible for managing and protecting the content and environments they host and deploy on the infrastructure that they use.

Data loss: even though Scaleway ensures the continuous activity of its data centers, there is no complete guarantee of data security. Clients are responsible for performing regular backups of all the data they host with a cloud provider, in order to avert the risk of data loss.

Connection loss: Scaleway is not an Internet Service Provider (ISP) and is not in charge of operating data transmission networks. If a power outage causes an internet connection failure, the ISP is responsible for restoring access to the network.

For more information on Scaleway’s liability, please refer to article 14 of our general terms of services, which are available on our website.




Please note that the above only applies to Scaleway’s data centers located in France.


Our customer service is available 24/7 to answer any questions you may have via Scaleway’s console or @Scaleway_Help on Twitter.