Advantages of Using a Green Data Center

December 20, 2012 By

 There are millions of servers running worldwide on a daily basis. Often these are being enhanced and managed, but they are not always used. It is approximated that these unused servers cost billions every year.  This will always be a major waste of money, as well as a waste of precious energy.

Green data centers have recognized these wastes and worked to repair them. Many MNC’s are now more eco-conscious and are contemplating what green data centers can offer. Here are a few common advantages associated with green data center use

1.       Turning Off Unused or Dead Servers

When a company partners with a data center, it provides a specified amount of storage it requires. From there, the data center will allocate required space and also additionally provide extra space for expansion. But this creates dead server space. It is estimated that up to a fifth of all servers are sitting idle. These hardware pieces will always consume power and other resources, increasing the costs incurred by both the data center as well as the customer. Green data centers turn off these dead servers. The energy consumption is lowered, and thus, costs, which results in lower customer fees.

2.       Virtualization

Most companies presume that they need one server for each piece of software. This is not true. Green data centers utilize what is referred to as virtualization. The software management system places multiple pieces of software on the same server. So this reduces the costs to a great extent.

3.       Delaying Capital Expenditures

One among the main reasons data centers cost so much is that the data center has expenditures for power use estimates. Green data centers completely remove this excess

spending by using power on demand. Constant monitoring and analysis allows green data centers to only use the amount of power they need. The unused power is used for other applications.

4.       Storage Consolidation:

By performing consolidation in data centers can result in gaining more efficiency and helps to move one step closer to become Green data centers. To know more about consolidation in data centers follow the link given below

http://www.datacentertalk.com/2012/12/steps-for-successful-data-center-consolidation/

5.       Installing Best Network Monitoring Tool

Installing best network monitoring tool will ensure less downtime and less resource wastage. These tools will also help data center managers to remove defected hardware which might consume more power than normal ones. In current industry you can find many network monitoring tools, select any one of the tool which suits your business and more even more closer in becoming Green data center.

Along with all these steps, data center managers should ensure to implement alternative methods of cooling data centers, power

resource and other necessary steps in order to gain Green Gold LEED (leadership in Energy and Environment design) certification from USGBC (U.S Green Building Council).

Green data centers will have higher fees to start, but in the long-term, they are more efficient and always cost effective.

 

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Microsoft Plans to Run Data Center on Biogas

November 20, 2012 By

Starting in March 2013 Microsoft has planned to run its Cheyenne, Wyoming data centers from biogas. Biogas for the data centers will be created at local waste management plant.  This will be a testing plant with a small modular demonstration. Microsoft will use the test results from this plant and learn how to implement these on other large data centers; these results will also help company to become less reliant on power.

This plant is created and maintained with a budget of $5.5 million, investment mainly coming from Microsoft and other financial sources. This plant is capable of creating power up to 300KW.  This plan will help the company to implement other alternative ways to power the rest of its data centers. This plant will use gas created with anaerobic digestion of dry waste + water, this anaerobic gas will power 300KW fuel cell and this fuel cell intern generate power. This power cell will run for 18 months with a close participation from University of Wyoming.

This is how the plant works; Sewage treatment plant will collect all the dry and other waste from house, cattle farms and other sources. These waste will be collected in anaerobic digester, anaerobic digester might contains many biodegradable materials like manure, municipal waste, crops, green waste, biomass, sewage etc. These collected wastes will be treated with water and fermentation process starts. These wastes under goes anaerobic digestion and emits biogas. Biogas mainly contains Hydrogen Sulfide, carbon-di-oxide and Methane. This gas powers the power cells which intern powers the entire plant.

If this plan becomes a success, then this trend will attract all internet companies like Yahoo, Apple, Google, Microsoft, EBay and Google. Microsoft has plans to neutralize its carbon emission by summer 2012. In future Microsoft has plans to collect materials for its digester from wastewater treatment plants, fuel refineries, agricultural farms, landfills sites etc. This is an uneconomical plan to gather all waste and convert it to energy. With all these plans Microsoft hopes to reduce its carbon emission from their data center.

All companies with data centers are aiming to lower their carbon emission associated with it. If this alternate power plant woks well, Microsoft might plan to build micro data centers at other plants. Microsoft has plans to open up mini data centers near water treatment plants. Microsoft has plans to setup this plant within next spring and make it working.

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FACTORS OF MEASUREMENT FOR A GREEN DATA CENTER

November 8, 2012 By

 

Managing a data center efficiently is a tough task. After taking the green plunge too, it is necessary that one measures the efficiency of those buildings.  This is because, to be completely efficient one needs to know at what rate does the data center use up the resources provided, what type of byproducts it is generating and most importantly how green it actually is.

Why fix something that is not broken?

People might take all that poking and prodding to find out the efficiency rate to be an exhaustive process.  But data center managers should remember that measuring certain parameters will help them understand their data center better. Based on these measurements, the managers can opt of upgrades and appropriate resources for the data center. It also helps them assess the success and growth rate accurately. It is shocking to find out that despite of its very important nature, many enterprises completely avoid the process. Surveys of more than 1,500 Data Center owners and operators at Datacenter Dynamics conferences in 2008 indicate that fewer than one in three were using Data Center efficiency metric and fewer than half definitely intended to use them in the future.

But what should we measure?

Now that the importance of measuring the efficiency has bee established, one needs to measure the right parameters so that those can aid in quantifying the impact of the various upgrades which are incorporated to make the data center green. Let us look at those pointers and try to understand why measuring them is important:

Power:

The data center runs on power and that’s what makes it the most important resources which needs measuring. Doing so will answer all queries, and will help one figure out the accurate rate of consumption of energy by the IT equipments, the lighting systems and the Cooling center.

It is pertinent to remember that power consumption is the most expensive operational cost of the data center.  If one measures the exact usage rate of this resource, then they will be able to save energy and capital by making necessary improvements.

Footprint:

Here, it means the carbon footprint. As we all know, carbon traps heat and if this is left unchecked, then it can hamper the temperature balance of the data centers. Carbon emission is largely man-made. This factor needs to be checked out because it has a domino effect on the working of a data center. Think about it, increase in temperature means the cooling units would work harder to maintain the temperature of the data center by consuming more power thereby decreasing the overall efficiency.

Battery rooms:

The generators in the battery room which start up in case of a power failure emit a ton of pollutants including gases like nitrogen oxides, hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide. Measuring and keeping a tab on the power consumption of the generators give a clear picture about the data center’s health report.

Hot air emission:

Hot air comes with the territory but a clear pathway is absolutely essential to make sure that it is disposed properly. This is crucial as this hot air, if left unattended would be re-circulated in the data center thereby increasing the temperature. Measuring the efficiency rate of the cooling units will let one gain insights how effectively is the hot air disposed and also will help them make a better decision in case an upgrade is required.

Water intake:

Needless to say, cooling tower requires gallons of water on a monthly basis and the water used also needs to be replaced.  This measurement has not been seriously considered, but it plays a pivotal role towards determining how green the data center is. Removing gallons of water from the local supplies has a huge impact on the environment on the whole and should not be ignored.

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ECO-FRIENDLY WEB HOSTING

October 31, 2012 By

With the increased use of internet these days, small and large scale businesses and entrepreneurs have realized the importance of marketing through the web. Internet has become a publicity tool for everyone who needs to make their presence felt. Every nook and corner of the world has access to the internet, and to the services available over it. Hence it becomes important for initial startup firms to have a website of their own, and create a definite position in the big fat web world. After creation of a website with the right content and design, the next step is to choose a source to host this website. This is the most strenuous and laborious task.

A web host has to be selected depending on the user’s requirements. There are a wide variety of web hosting options to choose from with each one trying to grab the attention of potential clients. One can opt for shared hosting, dedicated hosting, or meet the two in the form of VP (virtual private) server hosting. As if this was not enough, there is another hosting option available on the block called ‘Green Hosting’. This is one sustainable trend of hosting that has taken the internet world by a storm.

To define in layman’s terms, all the internet stuff that reaches every desktop, laptops, Tablets, and phones does not exist in outer space. It is getting processed in servers that have been housed in the facilities of the hosting firms. The only obstacle is that these servers are the consumers of a large amount of electricity and resources. The amount of fossil fuels used to power the servers in order to meet the ever growing demands of the internet is infinite. Some data centers and data storage facilities have come under the scanner for their excessive usage of power and other exhaustible resources. Hence some companies are deploying stringent procedures to facilitate eco friendly operations in their centers. Here is a check list that might garner some interest-

Virgin technology: It is a known fact that as server technology improves, operational efficiency also increases. Some companies have adopted a new strategy of using only the new servers. This has been a great move to reduce carbon footprint. Brain Host has been one such company and it states that newer technologies help reduce hot spots, and enable operation of efficient and less polluting servers.

Wind energy- The savior

Some companies have followed and are following a different track. They have not completely abandoned the concept of newer technologies, but have tried to offset their carbon footprint by purchasing wind credits. Green Geeks is one such company.

Companies do not like to run all their servers on wind power alone. Wind energy is one form of energy that largely depends on the geographical conditions of a region. It is a little too inconsistent. Inconsistent energy is not the right choice for centers that house enormous amounts of data. Companies have made a choice by combining the use of both fossil fuels and wind energy. Web hosting companies make use of energy from the existing grids, and then purchase wind credits to offset the fossil fuel energy that they used.

Location at its best: Some companies just take the credit for being situated in the best designed location. All that these companies had to do was to find the right location that best suits their current requirements, and future prospects. Iceland is one such location. The available geothermal and hydroelectric energy accounts for about 100% of all the electricity used.

Of course, green energy is not cheap, but it is definitely a good start towards being eco friendly.

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ELEMENTS OF EVALUATION FOR GREEN DATA CENTER COMPETENCE

October 29, 2012 By

There’s an often-used management dictum that says you can’t manage what you don’t measure, and it certainly applies to data centers.

It is important for data center technicians to understand the capacity and resources required to operate a data center facility as it is the prime most factor to understand about the consumption of these resources. Consumption of resources and the quantity of byproducts the data centers produce are proof to how much green the building is. The reason to measure data center efficiency is quite obvious. But the data centers in reality don’t seem to take notice of this radical necessity.

Elements to measure in a data center

After understanding the importance of measurement of critical elements in a data center, it is important to take note of the individual elements, and their impact on various other upgrades.

The Energy Factor: Energy is the primary element that needs to be monitored in a data center. Effective monitoring of energy should be capable of answering questions like- How much energy does the facility house, and how much energy is consumed by the IT equipment and other ancillary devices like cooling systems and lighting.

It is vital to measure energy for several reasons-

  • Power is a data center’s most valuable resource: The big energy demands of today’s high performance servers means most data centers will run out of power well before cabinet space or cooling. Even if you aren’t interested in green considerations, measuring energy usage is critical to understand the true capacity of the room.
  • Power is the common element among disparate data center subsystems: Air handlers, servers, and overhead lighting are all different infrastructure of a data center, so different that they’re each installed and maintained by personnel trained in separate disciplines, yet they all need power to function. Measuring energy consumption creates a common standard by which you can tell how much they’re each drawing upon your overall data center capacity.
  • Power consumption is the most expensive overhead cost of a data center: By measuring the specific energy usage of various data center components and applying the regional cost of electricity, you should be able to calculate the total monthly expenses of the components. This enables you to target which data center subsystems have the potential to save energy and money through energy efficiency programs.
  • Power consumption largely defines a data center’s environmental impact: The amount of power that a data center uses on a day-to-day basis determines how much irreplaceable fossil fuels it consumes and the quantity of carbon emissions it is responsible for.

Because of these four conditions, green data center improvements that conserve energy provide some of the largest benefits to your business. Measuring power in your data center is, therefore, also the best way to appraise that value and understand the real impact of those green improvements.

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eBay builds the Largest Clean Energy Project till Date

June 26, 2012 By

eBay recently announced its intentions of commiting to clean energy and hence have taken this initiative to a whole new level. According to industry reports, eBay will implement clean energy for its Utah data center. The company plans to use the local power grids for emergency backup power source. eBay has partnered up with Bloom Energy and has installed a 6 megawatt fuel cell installation in the data center campus. This data center is expected to be the largest non –utility fuel cell installation in the country.

It is reported that 30 Bloom Energy servers will be installed in the Utah data center. Each of these servers is capable of producing 1.75 million KWH of electricity annually. The fuel cells are going to be powered by biogas.

“By being a trail blazer and deploying a brand new, revolutionary architecture to build its new data center, eBay is raising the standard for the entire industry. It is 21st century infrastructure for the industry needs of the 21st century,” said KR Sridhar, principal co-founder and CEO of Bloom Energy. “Bloom Energy is thrilled to be supporting eBay on this innovative and inspiring large scale project.”

Bloom Energy operates a 650 kilowatt solar farm along with a 500- kilowatt fuel cell installation at its San Jose headquarters site. Once the eBay project is completed, it will become eBay’s largest renewable project.

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“Think Green” for Your Data Center

June 18, 2012 By

In the recent times, every one everywhere is going green. The term itself has become a trend. People are concerned about the climate change and are paying a keen attention to its “shiver sent down the spine“type of repercussions. Recycling, reducing pollution and supporting renewable energy are now being given order importance. Businesses too, are advertising their green practices and products. Organizations are seeking efficient, energy solutions for their data centers to reduce downtime, and increase output. Take a look at the few practices listed below  which will help you extend the life of datacenters while deferring new build-out costs.

See those equipments? Look closely:

As we all know, the equipments of the data center gulp down the majority of the power that is supplied to the data center. You would want to start your green trend here. Change any hardware which looks like it’s on the last term of its life cycle. Now, if you cannot replace them due to lack of resources, ensure that they are properly maintained. Doing so makes a noticeable impact on the overall energy use.

Point to be considered is that, these IT equipments come with thermostatic fan control, ensuring that these fans have a clear path to the machine, will keep the temperature in control and enhance the operation efficiency.

Keeping  the intake grills clean and making sure that accessories like cable management arms, in-rack PDUs are not blocking any exhaust ports will ensure optimum operation of the data center.

What’s in the AC Vents?

Data centers need heavy duty cooling equipments to maintain optimum temperature levels. Usually the air flow path is through the air conditioning equipments to the equipments and back to the AC equipment.

Sometimes, airflow might not follow that path. The air from the outlet might return to input which would in turn reduce the cooling efficiency and considerably decrease the AC’s capacity. Recirculation (hot air from the IT equipments might find its way to the AC inlet) is another possibility.

Managing airflow by keeping the hot and the cold air away from each other can aid the cost savings on cooling requirements effectively. Start by blocking any unused space around the racks so that there is not hot air leakage from the back of the rack to the front of it .Organizing the racks in the hot aisle/cold aisle will do the trick.

The unobstructed return of the hot air to the air conditioning equipment is every bit as important as the delivery of cold air. IT equipment rows should be located such that perimeter air conditioning equipment is centered at the end of hot aisles. If there are more hot aisles than air conditioners, placing empty, blanked racks at the end of the row nearest the air conditioner is an effective way to keep the hot air directed properly without affecting operating equipment. In many cases, the air can be further isolated with simple plastic curtains, ensuring that only cold air is supplied to the equipment and equally important, the hot air has a clear path back to the air conditioning equipment.

It’s a data center, not cold storage:

Now we know that the temperature in the data center has to be relatively cold, but it really shouldn’t feel like your blood is freezing over once you step into one. Overcooling is one of the many reasons why the data centers do not perform as efficiently as it should be. Maintain the temperature as per your equipment’s need. All major equipment manufacturers support the temperature range recommended by the American Society of Heating, Refrigeration and Air-conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) which has an upper limit of 77° F. This temperature range provides a good operation margin and considerable energy savings.

Chart the Data Center’s growth:

 Estimating various parameters like when and how you are planning to upgrade the data center will help you gain valuable insights on computing needs. Implementing a CFD model will help you estimate and predict various cooling related issues. Also examining the load on each server can result in accurate estimation of cost and energy savings.

Use Your PUE/DCIE

Power usage effectiveness helps one express the energy efficiency of their data center. Knowing your PUE will enable you to set goals and track efficiency of your data center. Once the value is known, you can modify and upgrade the system for power saving and cost effective solutions.

Bottom line is a well designed, organized data center will ensure that your business runs like a well-oiled machine. It will help you reduce the capital expenditure and delay the need of a complete replacement of the equipments. An effective data center is also environmentally feasible way to manage your operations.

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Apple’s data Center to Take Clean Energy to New Heights

May 30, 2012 By

According to industry reports, Apple’s 500,000 Sq. ft data center in Maiden, N.C has committed towards using clean energy for the facility. They have confirmed that the data center will completely run on renewable energy by the end of 2012.

Apple is planning on producing a staggering 60% of the clean energy onsite. The site will be installed with 100-acre of solar array. Each solar array is capable of producing 42 million kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity on an annual basis.

The 84 million kWh combined solar power will be added to the 40 million kWh of electricity that will be produced by an onsite bio-gas powered 5-megawatt fuel cell installation for a total of 124 million kWh of clean onsite power. The amount of power which will be generated through this medium is enough to provide electricity to 11,000 homes.

Though Apple is generating a major part of power onsite, they will be purchasing the remaining 40% form local vendors. It is reported that they are considering Catawba County Landfill for this purpose. NC Greenpower is going to start work on the landfill to convert methane gas generated there into usable electricity which will in turn provide power solutions to the data center.

Data Center Talk updates its resources every day. Visit us to know of the latest technology and standards from the data center world.Please leave your views and comments on DCT Forum

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Fuel Cells- Its Role in Data Centers

December 28, 2011 By

Everybody is talking about it. There is no escaping it. If you step out of the house these days, you’ll run into at least five people in one day who want to discuss it. What are we talking about? Tom Cruise’s latest movie? NO! Energy efficient data centers! Organizations are investing capital by the truckloads to get their data center off the power grid and running independently. The data centers draw so much power that they are starting to seem like power sucking black holes. Data center efficiency is one of the important factors to save the money and lot of  DC’s are working  towards the goal.

Companies are bringing back obsolete technology and re-engineering them. After thoroughly exhausting solar, wind and thermal options, scientists are now directing their attention to fuel cells. Fuel cell makers now believe that they can be used as a primary source to power the data center; grid power assisting the data center only as a backup supply. Fuel cells are modular by nature; thus, one can connect any number of cells as per data center requirement.

Fuel cells are devices that convert chemical energy into electrical energy through a chemical reaction. They generally use biogas or natural gas as their input; here is your answer to eco-friendly energy generation, minimizing any data center’s carbon footprint value. Since the fuel cells can be located on- site, power generated to power received ratio is quite high. Also, the power is clean; harmonics are either completely eliminated or minimized.

Although the initial investment for a fuel cell can be quite high, data centers can most certainly benefit from it in the long run. In cities where the cost of buying electricity per annum is very high, they are ideal as they contribute to faster return in investment. That, added with government incentives for the data centers that reduce their carbon footprint and energy consumption, and free publicity for going green, one cannot help but wonder why data centers all over the world are not looking into this prospective gold mine.

DCT believes that every small step taken to modernize data centers results in a revolution that saves the world millions of dollars in terms of energy.

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Powering Your Data Center with New Technology

December 7, 2011 By

A new report released on November 30, 2011 announced that fuel cells are now available to power your data center.  A fuel cell provides power by converting chemical energy into electricity by means of a chemical reaction. Fuel cells are used in many industrial and commercial industries, but using them in Data centers is a new concept.

Why Fuel Cells?

For data centers who want to be known as environmentally friendly then using fuel cells could be the answer. Fuel cells are much more reliable than using solar or wind power. They are still inexpensive and a great source of an alternative energy supply.

Natural gas fuel cells have been developed by ClearEdge Plus and they are targeting areas where power consumption is high and expensive like California. With demand and price increases no business can afford not to start looking at alternative energy sources. Energy rates in California are in the 17 – 23 cents range per kWh. A natural gas fuel cell could have those costs reduced down to the 9 cent range, a huge savings!

Fuel Cells Have Actually Been Here For Ages!

The idea of using fuel cells in data centers is not new. The concept of using Hydrogen fuel cells has been around for over a decade now. Resistance to these hydrogen cells was mainly due to storage concerns. Data center owners were not comfortable with the thought of storing natural gas on their property. The actual process of drawing power from hydrogen was thought to be messy and using electricity directly was much cleaner and convenient.

As with any process advances in technology have made processes cleaner and easier than ever before. This new technology uses a chemical process to convert the energy into electricity. Basically the hydrogen is split into protons and electrons. The electrons then pass through a circuit which produces the energy.

Benefits of Natural Gas Fuel Cell

The biggest benefit of using natural gas fuel cells is that they are clean running. Even though the initial outlay for the fuel cells is higher than regular batteries the fuel cell has a much longer life span.

Another benefit of using these types of fuel cells is that weigh less than batteries and a generator and make for much easier storage. This could have a huge impact if your data center is located on the upper floors of a high rise building.

For a great example of where fuel cells have been successfully used visit the following link. The First Silicon Valley Company to use Hydrogen Fuel Cell.

For more on environment friendly data centers,please visit Data Center Talk.

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