data centre strategies in consideration of climate change
DESCRIPTION
Delivered at the Data Centre Strategies conference in HK in 2008, under the moniker of Pacific Research and AnalysisTRANSCRIPT
Strategies for a sustainable data centre
Mr. Simon Perry
Data centre and Facilities Managers will find themselves increasingly at the forefront of practical efforts to reduce their business’s energy use and emissions. What do such efforts look like and how do we get from here to a lower energy facility? An introduction to strategic approaches to reducing a facility’s energy and emissions footprint; with a look forward to joined up strategic business thinking concerning energy usage and what that will mean to the data centre and the business’s building portfolio.
www.pacificra.com
Source: www.forbes.com
Short term: energy price volatility
Short to medium term: carbon emissions
Medium term: energy availability
Power to the building
Nearly 80% of available power is lost before it gets to you
Ene
rgy
loss
(%
)
70
25
7
30% 22.5% 21%Energy available
100%
0
REDUCE COST
INCREASE REVENUE
TA
CTIC
AL
STR
ATE
GIC
Adapt existing business model
to minimise energy usage
Innovate to take advantage of new market opportunities
Business responses and ITDatacentre Hardware
Datacentre Thermodynamics
Office IT equipment
Print services
Tele-commuting & Video conferencing
Datacentre Power Supply Design
Alternate computing models
Datacentre consolidation
Facilities energy usage reduction
Efficient energy usage
within existing business model
Today’s business focus
• Power in the building:
– Energy as used by the technology
• Power to the equipment
– rationalisation
– Consolidation
– AC versus DC supply
• Power for cooling
– better utilisation of equipment
– more efficient cooling systems
– thermodynamic tuning
Building design
• Thermally efficiency of walls and roofing
• Windows in the data centre
• Atmospheric isolation
• Entry and Egress
• Wiring design: is wiring stopping effective cooling, or even causing heating?
• Drop ceiling and raised floor design
Power requirements in the building
• Average utilisation <10%• Extremely low power efficiency• High heat generation • Average utilisation >60%
• Highly efficient power usage• Extreme heat generation in a concentrated space
Temperature and device reliability
• Most data centres run at 18-21C• In-built digital thermal sensors in CPUs
– TCase measures overall CPU temperature– TJunction measures CPU core temperature
• Modern CPUs have maximum TCase values of c. 60-70C• TJunction generally >85C (Intel states a top maximum core
temperature of 100-140C)• A suitable architecture (e.g. Blade) can be run
in an ambient environment of c30C without too much long-term problem
• New theory: • Relative humidity is the reliability killer
Computer equipment reliability
Cooling requirements
• Spot cooling is far more effective than overall cooling
– Hot aisles/cold aisles
– Forced laminar/turbulent cooling
– Routed cooling
– Routed heat removal
– Stepped cooling
– Natural cooling
• Humidity control (Dew point)
Big Picture Business Drivers
1900
2010
2000
1950
1930
1970
1980
• Petrochemicals
• Industrial Production
• Transportation
• Post WWII rebuild
• Plastics
• Aviation
• Automotive
• Telecommunications
• Enterprise &
Consumer
computing
• Energy restrictions
• Energy reorganisation
• Emissions reduction
• Local resilience
REDUCE COST
INCREASE REVENUE
TA
CTIC
AL
STR
ATE
GIC
Adapt existing business model
to minimise energy usage
Innovate to take advantage of new market opportunities
Business responses and ITDatacentre Hardware
Datacentre Thermodynamics
Office IT equipment
Print services
Tele-commuting & Video conferencing
Datacentre Power Supply Design
Alternate computing models
Datacentre consolidation
Emissions reduction consulting
Energy monitoring and control
Alternative energy generation
Supply chain reorganisation
Co-locate facilities & renewable power
Reduce embodied carbon
Facilities energy usage reduction
Efficient energy usage
within existing business model
Recyclability - Power
(C)CHP
• (Community) Combined Heat and Power
– Generally gas powered smaller electricity generating plant
– Overcomes the problem of large centralised generating plant just losing c.20% of available energy through heat
– Overall thermal efficiency of around 80%
– Excess power and heat can be sold back to the grid or the community.
– >75% of Denmark’s energy comes from CCHP
– Available from low kW to large MW of power output
Conclusions
• Energy efficient data centre is more than just about power and cooling to the hardware
• The building can be just as important as the equipment
• Management will require granular measurement
• Performance reporting will likely be legislated
• The whole area is incredibly complex – but the future will necessitate a better overall approach
• Future approaches will call upon the skills you are developing today
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