ENERGY
CENTRE
Spiralling energy costs are
facilities management fun
of datacentres, writes Tob
ccording to a recent survey by
A
Energy Watch, electricity costs
in the UK have increased by
around 60 per cent since
2003. This has clearly been
felt across the whole of the FM function of
course, but the now ubiquitous datacentre
has arguably been the most hard hit.
Today 50p is spent on energy for every
pound spent on hardware – something
expected to increase by 54 per cent over
the next four years. These cost increases
are driving managers to revisit the way
datacentres are managed, closely linked
with the ethical desire to manage the
centres in a more environmentally friendly
way. As usual, the bottom line and the
environment are inextricably linked.
Fortunately there are some obvious
aspects of datacentre design and
management to target. Semiconductor
giant Intel estimates about 7.5 per cent of
the power going into datacentres actually
does what it’s intended to do. That leaves
92.5 per cent to be picked up through
efficiency and design changes. With 40
per cent of carbon impact stemming from
IT equipment, something clearly needs to
be done. Up to 60 per cent of the energy
bill is for cooling and market researcher
IDC reckons energy costs for servers will
match acquisition costs by 2012. Add to
this the fact that datacentres have doubled
their energy use in the past five years and
it’s obvious energy management is vital.
Most datacentres were traditionally
designed to handle an average 300 to
750 watts per square metre across the
total raised-floor area. However, the high
power density of blade servers and new
storage technologies require datacentres
to handle 3,000 watts or higher per
square metre in the local area where
blade servers are deployed – and this
30|
SUSTAINABLE FM | APRIL 2008
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44