Under China’s “Dual-Carbon” strategic goal, reducing carbon emissions in computing centers has become a critical challenge. The increasing scale of data centers, particularly in the context of initiatives such as “East Data, West Computing,” necessitates new approaches that jointly optimize computing efficiency and carbon footprint. This paper aims to address this challenge by proposing a novel carbon-computing coupling optimization framework and a green scheduling system designed to minimize the carbon emissions associated with computational tasks while maintaining system robustness. We first establish a carbon efficiency dynamic equilibrium equation and introduce the concept of virtual carbon flow to model the carbon footprint of computing tasks. Based on this modeling, we develop a deep reinforcement learning (DRL) based scheduler that dynamically migrates tasks to low-carbon nodes. In addition, we integrate a digital twin platform that preemptively simulates failure scenarios to enhance system robustness and resilience. Experimental results in simulated “East Data, West Computing” scenarios demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach. The system reduces carbon emissions per unit of computing power by 18%, improves the energy efficiency ratio in western nodes by 35%, and decreases the Mean Time to Recovery (MTTR) from 2 hours to 15 minutes. These findings validate the potential of carbon-computing coupling optimization in achieving both sustainability and reliability goals for large-scale computing centers.
| Published in | American Journal of Computer Science and Technology (Volume 9, Issue 2) |
| DOI | 10.11648/j.ajcst.20260902.11 |
| Page(s) | 49-57 |
| Creative Commons |
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited. |
| Copyright |
Copyright © The Author(s), 2026. Published by Science Publishing Group |
Carbon Efficiency Optimization, Virtual Carbon Flow, Green Scheduling, Deep Reinforcement Learning, Digital Twin
(1)
: Computational output measured in FLOP (Floating Point Operations)
: Electrical energy consumption (kWh)
: Cooling energy consumption (kWh)
: Weighting coefficients adjusted based on regional carbon intensity factors
and
are dynamically adjusted based on real-time carbon intensity of electricity:
(2)
(3)
: Real-time carbon intensity of local electricity grid (gCO2/kWh)
: Average carbon intensity across all available regions
: Power Usage Effectiveness of the local data center
, Node list
with carbon intensity
for tasks sorted by carbon sensitivity
in
:
in
:
using current
// Weighted scoring
,
) to
not empty:
with highest score
to node
that achieved
for
based on new workload
(4)
: Carbon concentration at location
and time
: Diffusion coefficient representing carbon dispersion characteristics
: Velocity field of carbon flow influenced by energy transmission
: Source term representing carbon emission from computing activities
is calculated as:
(5)
: Power consumption of computing node
: Carbon intensity of electricity for node
: Dirac delta function
: Position of node
(6)
in D
: Component | Eastern Nodes Specification | Western Nodes Specification |
|---|---|---|
Compute Nodes | 4x NVIDIA DGX A100 (320 GPUs) | 8x Supermicro AS-4124GS-TNR (256 CPUs) |
Energy Source | Grid electricity (0.78 kgCO2/kWh) | Renewable mix (0.21 kgCO2/kWh) |
PUE | 1.67 | 1.22 |
Network Latency | 5-7ms (within region) | 32-38ms (cross-region) |
Storage | 4PB All-Flash Array | 8PB HDD Array with NVMe cache |
Cooling System | Chilled water cooling | Direct free cooling |
Workload Type | Proportion | Compute Intensity | Data Locality | QoS (Quality of Service) Requirements |
|---|---|---|---|---|
AI Training | 35% | GPU-intensive | Low | Medium priority |
AI Inference | 25% | Mixed CPU/GPU | High | High priority |
Big Data Analytic | 20% | CPU-intensive | Medium | Low priority |
Scientific Computing | 15% | CPU/GPU hybrid | Low | Variable priority |
Web Services | 5% | CPU-intensive | High | High priority |
Metric | Eastern Nodes | Western Nodes |
|---|---|---|
Current Carbon Intensity | 0.78 kgCO2/kWh | 0.21 kgCO2/kWh |
Current Load | 68% | 82% |
PUE | 1.67 | 1.22 |
Renewable Energy Mix | 5% | 78% |
Active Tasks | 142 | 187 |
Queue Length | 23 | 8 |
Timestamp | Action | Task ID | Source Node | Target Node | Carbon Saved | Performance Impact |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
14: 32: 05 | Migrate | T-2301 | Eastern-03 | Western-07 | 0.52 kgCO2 | +2.3% latency |
14: 31: 22 | Assign | T-2287 | – | Western-12 | 0.38 kgCO2 | – |
14: 30: 18 | Hold | T-2265 | Eastern-01 | – | 0.00 kgCO2 | – |
14: 29: 45 | Migrate | T-2243 | Eastern-08 | Western-04 | 0.61 kgCO2 | +1.8% latency |
14: 28: 50 | Assign | T-2221 | – | Western-15 | 0.44 kgCO2 | – |
Component | Risk Score | Predicted Failure | Recommended Action | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Eastern-03 Cooling | 87% | 12 min | Migrate tasks to Western | ✓ Executed |
Western-08 PSU | 42% | 45 min | Standby unit ready | Monitoring |
Eastern-07 Network | 23% | – | No action | Healthy |
Western-12 Temp | 91% | 8 min | Throttle + migrate | ✓ Executed |
Metric | Value |
|---|---|
Carbon Emissions Reduction | 18.1% (vs. SCAS) |
Western Node Utilization | 82.7% (↑20.7% vs. SCAS) |
Energy Efficiency | 15.83 MFLOP/kWh (↑19.4% vs. SCAS) |
Mean Time to Recovery (MTTR) | 15 min (from 120 min baseline) |
Migration Overhead | 0.8% (↓61.9% vs. SCAS) |
QoS Violation Rate | 1.9% (↓32.1% vs. SCAS) |
Metric | PFS | EES | SCAS | C3O (Ours) | Improvement |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Carbon Emissions (kgCO2/MFLOP) | 0.417 | 0.352 | 0.298 | 0.244 | 18.1% reduction |
Energy Efficiency (MFLOP/kWh) | 8.72 | 11.35 | 13.26 | 15.83 | 19.4% improvement |
Western Node Utilization | 42.3% | 57.8% | 68.5% | 82.7% | 20.7% improvement |
QoS Violation Rate | 2.8% | 4.3% | 3.7% | 1.9% | 32.1% reduction |
Migration Overhead | 0.4% | 1.2% | 2.1% | 0.8% | 61.9% reduction |
Mean Time to Recovery (MTTR) | 120 min | 95 min | 73 min | 15 min | 79.5% reduction |
Workload Type | PFS | EES | SCAS | C3O |
|---|---|---|---|---|
AI Training | 0.581 | 0.492 | 0.413 | 0.319 |
AI Inference | 0.382 | 0.327 | 0.286 | 0.241 |
Big Data Analytic | 0.415 | 0.352 | 0.312 | 0.263 |
Scientific Computing | 0.437 | 0.371 | 0.324 | 0.268 |
Web Services | 0.289 | 0.257 | 0.231 | 0.205 |
DRL | Deep Reinforcement Learning |
MTTR | Mean Time to Recovery |
IEA | International Energy Agency |
FLOP | Floating Point Operations |
CI | Carbon Intensity |
PUE | Power Usage Effectiveness |
PQ | Priority Queue |
ADI | Alternating Direction Implicit |
MDP | Markov Decision Process |
DQN | Deep Q-Network |
LSTM | Long Short-Term Memory |
QoS | Quality of Service |
PFS | Performance-First Scheduler |
EES | Energy-Efficient Scheduler |
SCAS | Static Carbon-Aware Scheduler |
C3O | Carbon-Computing Coupling Optimization System |
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APA Style
Xie, G., Wei, W. (2026). Carbon-Computing Coupling Optimization and Green Scheduling System for Intelligent Computing Centers. American Journal of Computer Science and Technology, 9(2), 49-57. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajcst.20260902.11
ACS Style
Xie, G.; Wei, W. Carbon-Computing Coupling Optimization and Green Scheduling System for Intelligent Computing Centers. Am. J. Comput. Sci. Technol. 2026, 9(2), 49-57. doi: 10.11648/j.ajcst.20260902.11
@article{10.11648/j.ajcst.20260902.11,
author = {Guiyuan Xie and Wenguo Wei},
title = {Carbon-Computing Coupling Optimization and Green Scheduling System for Intelligent Computing Centers},
journal = {American Journal of Computer Science and Technology},
volume = {9},
number = {2},
pages = {49-57},
doi = {10.11648/j.ajcst.20260902.11},
url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajcst.20260902.11},
eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ajcst.20260902.11},
abstract = {Under China’s “Dual-Carbon” strategic goal, reducing carbon emissions in computing centers has become a critical challenge. The increasing scale of data centers, particularly in the context of initiatives such as “East Data, West Computing,” necessitates new approaches that jointly optimize computing efficiency and carbon footprint. This paper aims to address this challenge by proposing a novel carbon-computing coupling optimization framework and a green scheduling system designed to minimize the carbon emissions associated with computational tasks while maintaining system robustness. We first establish a carbon efficiency dynamic equilibrium equation and introduce the concept of virtual carbon flow to model the carbon footprint of computing tasks. Based on this modeling, we develop a deep reinforcement learning (DRL) based scheduler that dynamically migrates tasks to low-carbon nodes. In addition, we integrate a digital twin platform that preemptively simulates failure scenarios to enhance system robustness and resilience. Experimental results in simulated “East Data, West Computing” scenarios demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach. The system reduces carbon emissions per unit of computing power by 18%, improves the energy efficiency ratio in western nodes by 35%, and decreases the Mean Time to Recovery (MTTR) from 2 hours to 15 minutes. These findings validate the potential of carbon-computing coupling optimization in achieving both sustainability and reliability goals for large-scale computing centers.},
year = {2026}
}
TY - JOUR T1 - Carbon-Computing Coupling Optimization and Green Scheduling System for Intelligent Computing Centers AU - Guiyuan Xie AU - Wenguo Wei Y1 - 2026/04/29 PY - 2026 N1 - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajcst.20260902.11 DO - 10.11648/j.ajcst.20260902.11 T2 - American Journal of Computer Science and Technology JF - American Journal of Computer Science and Technology JO - American Journal of Computer Science and Technology SP - 49 EP - 57 PB - Science Publishing Group SN - 2640-012X UR - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajcst.20260902.11 AB - Under China’s “Dual-Carbon” strategic goal, reducing carbon emissions in computing centers has become a critical challenge. The increasing scale of data centers, particularly in the context of initiatives such as “East Data, West Computing,” necessitates new approaches that jointly optimize computing efficiency and carbon footprint. This paper aims to address this challenge by proposing a novel carbon-computing coupling optimization framework and a green scheduling system designed to minimize the carbon emissions associated with computational tasks while maintaining system robustness. We first establish a carbon efficiency dynamic equilibrium equation and introduce the concept of virtual carbon flow to model the carbon footprint of computing tasks. Based on this modeling, we develop a deep reinforcement learning (DRL) based scheduler that dynamically migrates tasks to low-carbon nodes. In addition, we integrate a digital twin platform that preemptively simulates failure scenarios to enhance system robustness and resilience. Experimental results in simulated “East Data, West Computing” scenarios demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach. The system reduces carbon emissions per unit of computing power by 18%, improves the energy efficiency ratio in western nodes by 35%, and decreases the Mean Time to Recovery (MTTR) from 2 hours to 15 minutes. These findings validate the potential of carbon-computing coupling optimization in achieving both sustainability and reliability goals for large-scale computing centers. VL - 9 IS - 2 ER -