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Permalink Reply by Benjamin Brink on July 30, 2009 at 22:15

One technique is to combine the DC with a renewable energy power utility plant. Revenue from selling excess energy production becomes a second source of revenue. Costs are more stable since you have direct control over power etc. etc.

If you're going solar, design the solar to output at least a day's worth of DC energy needs on the day of the year with the least amount of available solar energy. That way, you have a net 100% green facility year-round and revenue on at least 364 days, a side benefit is providing the local area with green energy. You still need to be really proactive with HVAC to minimize the load etc.

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Permalink Reply by Ray Jones on July 31, 2009 at 17:06

Excellent information Benjamin; many thanks - wold you mind if I linked to this from my Twitter account (as this is purely a carbon trust / green data center resource). I'm intersted especially in the renewable energy power utility plant idea. Sadly in UK solar power is still not a genuine option as we simply don't get enough sun throughout the year. Thanks again for an informative and interesting reply. Ray

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Permalink Reply by Vicki May on August 3, 2009 at 17:05

Hi Ray,

From what I've read about data centres, cooling equipment seems to be the greatest energy consumer for the data centre industry, and there are many examples of new data centres which use natural cooling methods to reduce energy consumption (and therefore carbon footprints).

You also mention a potential green tax to be levied on operators - this looks set to be introduced in the near future, at least in the UK. A new 'Carbon Reduction Commitment' will be introduced by the UK Government on 1st April 2010.

Throughout 2008, the UK Government audited large energy users (6,000 MW hours per year) and next year will issue proforma invoices for the CRC levy, which is calculated at £12.00 per carbon tonne. Local authorities currently charge carbon at £30.00 per tonne. The charge will be fixed for two years, when the Government will open up a carbon trading market. The only way to avoid the levy is to reduce the amount of electricity used on site once the CRC is introduced.

As an example of the impact the CRC might have on businesses, and how green technologies could help to minimise the negative aspects, let me explain how this works at The Elean Data Campus in Cambridge, UK, which we believe will be Europe's greenest data centre (though it won't be carbon-free).

Elean has been designed to minimise electricity consumption through the use of its adjacent straw-burning power plant to produce combined heat and power on site, ensuring a minimum electricity specification of 1,500 watts per sq metre. It will also be supported by two independent grid supplies. Through absorption cooling at the adjacent power plant, the site’s electricity profile has been reduced from an industry standard of 65MW to an actual maximum load of 34MW.

(As an aside, as you mentioned tax, companies at the Elean Data Campus will be exempt from the CRC levy because of the efficiency of the energy systems employed, and in addition they will have their utility bills reduced by 27.5%. Studies undertaken by Elean have shown that this is equal to a reduction in energy bills at today's costs of £12.7 million.)

Best wishes,
Vicki

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Permalink Reply by Ray Jones on August 3, 2009 at 22:03

Hi Vicki

Thank you for a very informative reply. The data centre sounds fascinating; I built up the business model for the University of Manchester's data centres and was involved right up until it was privatised and made commercial. The university kept a portion for academic use but the commercial side was given up in order to compy with the university's 2015 plan.

The original datacentre was a focus point for supercomputing and of course power was always an issue and of course the additional power required for cooling.

I'd be absolutely delighted to have the opportunity to look around the Elean Data Campus as my current company is striving for as little carbon footprint as possible and we have reduced our power use by 40% through virtualisation and building low-power servers.

The CRC levy exemption is obviously of interest and the Data Campus fits in very well with our corporate ethos - will the Data Campus be open to commercial ventures or mainly academic?

I have helped other companies in reducing carbon footprint through the use of flywheel UPS as opposed to batteries but the concept of using a straw burning facility is something new to me and one that I find very interesting.

Thank you again for your response and please feel free to email me at admin@babakoto.co.uk.

Best wishes

Ray

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Permalink Reply by John Peterson, PE PMP CEM LEED on August 4, 2009 at 18:05

Solar has yet to prove itself as worth the maintenance and fluctuation in power, plus the area required for even small loads has been far outside the scope of most projects. Wind has not been viable due to the shear amount of power required at the locations where they are built. Buying via green power would be nice, but I haven't seen where to buy 10 MW of power from green sources without added cost.

Geothermal has been the approach we have been pushing, and it has been successful with some clients. Geothermal has a higher first-cost that scares clients away from planning and installing the systems, but every study & white paper shows that it is a viable solution. However, geothermal is like a big battery - it needs recharged or else it heats up the ground too much to be useful for a data center. But during the times you are recharging the geothermal system (winter months) your mechanical equipment is running much more efficiently.

In addition to the system efficiency savings, geothermal is more reliable than the other technologies, a definite must for a data center.

Most modern data center designs incorporate free cooling for a good portion, if not the majority with raised supply air temperatures, of the year, allowing the mechanical cooling to be minimized and further increasing geothermal system efficiency.

Carbon neutral? Well, that would be something a long time coming given that the density of data centers has been increasing year after year. But if we can get 160 watts/sqft to be neutral, someday we'll get 1600 w/sqft to be neutral too.

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Permalink Reply by Ray Jones on November 7, 2009 at 11:15

Thanks for a very interesting and informative response John, I'm afraid I have been out of action for a couple of months so was not able to reply sooner.

I totally agree about carbon neutrality and the only way to gain such a label it seems is by offsetting which to me is not the answer at all. I like the idea of geothermal though and we shall be looking into it in more detail.

We have also looked at solar and you're absolutely right; there is no way a DC could use solar for main power but ic could be used as auxillary for example for office lighting etc.

We are also investigating a number of heat exchange options. There are ways to use waste heat to provide heating for other areas.

At Getronics in our National Data Centre we have raised the level of cooling by 3-4 degrees as today's servers have a much higher comfprt zone and this alone has saved many MW per annum.

All in all it is great to see so many companies looking into ways to reduce their carbon footprint and in many ways I believe that our industry is leading the way

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Permalink Reply by Eric Lars Larson on September 3, 2009 at 20:58

Ray,
Take a look at http://greenhousedata.com/
They claim 100% renewable energy used.

They are one of the many data centers participating in the ColoFind.net system.

Eric

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Permalink Reply by Ray Jones on November 7, 2009 at 11:09

Eric

Thanks for this, very interesting

Ray

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