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Data Center Definition and Solutions - Part 2

       

      What is a green data center?

      A green data center is one that can operate with maximum energy efficiency and minimum environmental impact. This includes the mechanical, lighting, electrical and IT equipment (servers, storage, network, etc.). Within corporations, the focus on green data centers is driven primarily by a desire to reduce the tremendous electricity costs associated with operating a data center. That is, going green is recognized as a way to reduce operating expense significantly for the IT infrastructure.

      The interest in green data centers is also being driven by the federal government. In 2006, Congress passed public law 109-431 asking the EPA to: "analyze the rapid growth and energy consumption of computer data centers by the Federal Government and private enterprise."

      In response, the EPA developed a comprehensive report analyzing current trends in the use of energy and the energy costs of data centers and servers in the U.S. and outlined existing and emerging opportunities for improving energy efficiency. It also made recommendations for pursuing these energy-efficiency opportunities broadly across the country through the use of information and incentive-based programs.

      According to the EPA report, the two largest consumers of electricity in the data center are:

      • Support infrastructure — 50% of total
      • General servers — 34% of total

      Since then, significant strides have been made to improve the efficiency of servers. High density blade servers and storage are now offering much more compute capacity per Watt of energy. Server virtualization is allowing organizations to reduce the total number of servers they support, and the introduction of EnergyStar servers have all combined to provide many options for both the public and private sectors to reduce that 34% of electricity being spent on the general servers.

      Of course, the greatest opportunity for further savings is in the support infrastructure of the data center facility itself. According to the EPA, most data centers consume 100% to 300% of additional power for the support systems than are being used for their core IT operations. Through a combination of best practices and migration to fast-payback facility improvements (like ultrasonic humidification and tuning of airflow), this overhead can be reduced to about 30% of the IT load.

       

      What are some top stakeholder concerns about data centers?

      While the data center must provide the resources necessary for the end users and the enterprise's applications, the provisioning and operation of a data center is divided (sometimes uncomfortably) between IT, facilities and finance, each with its own unique perspective and responsibilities.

      IT: It is the responsibility of the business's IT group to make decisions regarding what systems and applications are required to support the business' operations. IT will directly manage those aspects of the data center that relate directly to the IT systems while relying on facilities to provide for the data center's power, cooling, access and physical space.

      Facilities: The facilities group is generally responsible for the physical space — for provisioning, operations and maintenance, along with other building assets owned by the company. The facilities group will generally have a good idea of overall data center efficiency and will have an understanding of and access to IT load information and total power consumption.

      Finance: The finance group will be responsible for aligning near term vs. long term capital expenditures (CAPEX) to acquire or upgrade physical assets and operating expenses (OPEX) to run them with overall corporate financial operations (balance sheet and cash flow).

      Perhaps the biggest challenge confronting these three groups is that by its very nature a data center rarely will be operating at or even close to its optimally defined range. With a typical life cycle of 10 years (or perhaps longer), it is essential that the data center's design remains sufficiently flexible to support increasing power densities and various degrees of occupancy over a not insignificant period of time. This in-built flexibility should apply to power, cooling, space and network connectivity. When a facility is approaching its limits of power, cooling and space, the organization will be confronted by the need to optimize its existing facilities, expand them or establish new ones.

       

      What options are available when I'm running out of power, space or cooling?

      Optimize: The quickest way to address this problem and increase available power, space and cooling is to optimize an existing facility. The biggest gains in optimization can be achieved by reducing overall server power load (through virtualization) and by improving the efficiency of the facility. For example, up to 70% of the power required to cool and humidify the data center environment can be conserved with currently available technologies such as outside air economizers, ultrasonic humidification, high efficiency transformers and variable frequency drive units (VFDs). Using these techniques when combined with new, higher density IT systems will allow many facilities to increase IT capacity while simultaneously decreasing facility overhead.

      Move: If your existing data center can no longer be upgraded to support today's more efficient (but hotter running and more energy-thirsty) higher-density deployments, there may be nothing you can do except to move to a new space. This move will likely begin with a needs assessment/site selection process and will conclude with an eventual build-out of your existing facility or a move to a new building and site.

      Outsource: Besides moving forward with your own new facility, there are two other options worth consideration:

      • Colocation: This means moving your data center into space in a shared facility managed by an appropriate service provider. As there are a broad range of business models for how these services can be provided (including business liability), it is important to make sure the specific agreement terms match your short-and-long term needs and (always) take into account the flexibility you require so that your data center can evolve over its lifespan.
      • Cloud computing: The practice of leveraging shared computing and storage resources — and not just the physical infrastructure of a colocation provider — has been growing rapidly for certain niche-based applications. While cloud computing has significant quality-of-service, security and compliance concerns that to date have delayed full enterprise-wide deployment, it can offer compelling advantages in reducing startup costs, expenses and complexity.