BANGALORE, INDIA: This year, mankind will create 1.2 trillion gigabytes (GB) of data, equivalent to 75 billion 16 GB iPods. That’s more than enough for every person on earth to own 10 iPods, finds Emerson Network Power, a business of Emerson, in its 2011 State of the Data Center infographic.

The infographic examines the growth and growing importance of the data centre.

“Over the last several years, advances in technology, an increased reliance on the internet and social media as well as an increased focus on energy management initiatives have had a significant impact on the data center world,” said Scott Barbour, business leader of Emerson Network Power. “Data centres are the unsung heroes. This infographic illustrates how our reliance on them has grown exponentially.”

When internet users perform search engine queries, make purchases on their favourite retailer’s website or connect with friends via social media, data centers are making it all happen. For example: $53 Billion in cyber weekend sales is larger than the entire economy of Bulgaria. With so much activity and reliance on the internet, having a reliable data center infrastructure is more important than ever, the company says.

Moreover, the growing dependence on the data center means growing consequences of downtime. If all 509,147 data centers went out 2.5 times (based on an average) for a duration of 134 minutes, that would equal 2,842,737 hours of downtime, at a total loss of $426 billion a year, it adds.