Solar Protocol is a web platform hosted on a network of independent servers powered by solar energy and distributed worldwide. The server presented here will contribute to this network as the only one in Europe to join the initiative. Operating intermittently depending on the presence or absence of sunlight, it redirects user-requests to the server generating the most solar energy at any given moment. As a genuine alternative to energy-intensive data centres, this project demonstrates that digital systems can adapt to the fluctuations of renewable energy sources.
If the internet were a country, it would rank third in the world for energy consumption. The issues raised by Solar Protocol are therefore crucial. The server presented here belongs to a network of servers managed by volunteers, hosting the data required for a user to access the website solarprotocol.net. Like a digital artist-run space, it publishes creative digital content accessible to all.
Each server, identical to the others, is powered by a solar panel paired with a battery designed to support approximately twenty-four hours of activity. This pairing results in intermittent connectivity, dependent on local weather conditions, the length of the day, and the seasons. The system is designed based on available energy: when a user accesses the site, their request is redirected to the server with the largest energy stock, thus benefiting from the most favorable recent sunlight accumulation. By shifting the priority from speed to a logic based on available renewable energy, this project explores automation, not through artificial intelligence but through natural intelligence derived from planetary dynamics.
The film Can the Sun Do the Thinking, by Tega Brain, documents the human activities of the volunteers who care for the different servers in the network according to contextual conditions. It pays tribute to the ecological criteria that constrain the necessary infrastructure—and not the other way around.
