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Is your data center efficient?
Standardized metrics will help drive the measuring of data center efficiency, but until those metrics are available, data center managers can conduct assessments today.
Many consultants and companies, including Emerson Network Power (www.emerson.com) and NetApp (www.netapp.com), offer assessment services to help data center managers determine whether their data center is efficient and can provide recommendations for lowering costs and eliminating vulnerabilities.
Liebert Service, a division of Emerson Network Power, was started in the late 1980s to service Liebert cooling and power products. Since then, it has expanded into a full data center assessment service that identifies hot spots, resolves power and cooling inefficiencies and problems, and ensures proper capacity.
“We typically send in two or more engineers that go through a huge data gathering process,” explains Omar McKee, manager of service solutions for Emerson Network Power Liebert Service (www.liebert.com). “They meet with the customer to gather as much qualitative information as possible about their operations and business objectives, and then they literally map out the space with a detailed data center floor plan and information about all the equipment, including capacity, temperature, airflow, load ratings, etc.”
McKee says the information is then “put through a computational fluid dynamics analysis to provide 3D renderings that model temperature and airflow, show the customer exactly what’s in their space, and make recommendations to solve power and cooling issues, improve efficiency, and provide guidelines for future growth.”
In addition to capacity and efficiency, the data center assessment includes everything from checking the height of the raised floor, cabling, and airflow obstructions to hot aisle/cold aisle configurations, safety concerns, and grounding and bonding.
“It’s hard to pinpoint a single common issue that we see with data center assessments--it’s really a culmination of many problems, and the issues are the same across vertical markets and geographies,” says Jeff Powers, senior product manager, Emerson Network Power Liebert Service. “The one issue we find time and time again is the lack of knowledge of what equipment is actually in the data center and what’s it’s doing.” — Betsy Ziobron
Reprinted with full permission of Cabling Installation & Maintenance www.cablinginstall.com
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