The Data Center Consolidation Project

Data center consolidation projects are not out of fashion yet. NYC and the feds move to consolidate their sprawling infrastructure to gain financial and energy efficiencies. ...

NYC Data Center Consolidation via InformationWeek: "current IT infrastructure of New York City is fragmented, with more than 50 unique data centers serving nearly 48 city agencies, many located in prime commercial real estate space. " NYC IT plans overhaul of data infrastructure: "The consolidation will lower the City’s cost of operations by up to $100 million over five years, reduce energy consumption and emissions, strengthen security, and improve overall IT service quality for agencies."

Federal Data Center Consolidation via Data Center Knowledge: Agencies are challenged to ... "prepare an inventory of the IT assets by April 30 and develop a preliminary data center consolidation plan by June 30. " by Federal CIO.

Green IT Pilot Project

HP and Eaton will collaborate on green IT project to drive energy efficiency in server racks through government grant program. ...

... "The joint project from Eaton and HP will develop a fully enclosed IT rack system that provides its own internal power and cooling. High voltage and chilled water will act as the primary inputs to the system and it will also accept alternative energy power sources, such as wind and solar power.

A major benefit of this system is a 38 percent reduction in energy use to support a 100 kilowatt (kW) IT load, which equals a reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by approximately 400 tons annually. " ...

Via Eaton Corp: Energy Efficiency in IT, Stimulus Grant

Proof-of-Concept Testing

Internet Initiative Japan adapts its green data center design with US market trend of ambient air cooling and shifts into proof of concept ahead of commercializing new container data center product. ...

... "They will build a modular data center with a cooling system that directly uses outside air, and operate it for one year starting in February 2010, with the aim of commercialization. This will be the first data center in Japan with a container unit cooled all year round by outside air. " ...

Via Internet Initiative Japan: Proof-of-Concept Data Center

Focused Green IT Benefits

Leave high-level measures to the enterprise sustainability initiative and focus the IT organization on metrics that are in their path of control. ...

... "To sustain focus and support for a green IT strategy, CIOs must select granular performance metrics that enable comparison and prioritisation, such as percentage of equipment entered into recycling programs and power usage efficiency (PUE) or KW/CPU hours delivered. " ...

Via Silicon: CIO Green Guide

Data Center Efficiency Project Targets Cooling System

IBM leverages measurement tools from its Research Division to identify and implement energy savings opportunities in the cooling system of Toyota's California data center. Electricity provider, Southern California Edison, created a baseline and validated power demand decrease. ...

... "IBM also piloted an extension of MMT which includes real-time sensors that are distributed in strategic places throughout the data center. The updated version of the technology allowed IBM to constantly monitor temperature distributions throughout the project. " ...

Via IBM: Toyota Motor Sales Data Center

Data Center Design

WWII-era bunkers are being retrofit for reuse as secure, green data centers. ...

... "Using innovative approaches to energy, cost and space efficiency, these bunkers are being converted into Tier III high-density rack-ready powered base facilities, that will exceed industry standards. " ...

Via Prairie Bunkers: Design

Its Nebraska data center will use geothermal cooling system.

Power IT Down on August 27

Sign up and power down your computer equipment at the end of the day on August 27th to see the impact. ...

... "Do it for the environment. Do it for the next generation. But first, do it just for one day. " ...

Via HP: Power IT Down Day

Power Project Reviews

Raytheon's information technology group delivers sustainability achievements through server virtualization and other data center improvements, while establishing a process that ensures efficient computing is part of the IT culture. ...

... "The company's IT project management process now includes power reviews to ensure that project teams estimate power consumption of new systems and work in advance to achieve reductions. " ...

Via Computerworld, IDG: Raytheon IT

Working Capital Impact

Target comatose servers to reduce capital requirements and ultimately increase energy efficiency. ...

. .. "Every comatose commodity server shut down or eliminated by consolidation or physical virtualization, recovers between $1,500 and $2,500 in CapEx capacity. " ...

Via Forbes: IT Energy

Data Center Visual Map

HP offers solutions for data centers with scale that include visual maps of environmental performance for energy tuning and optimization. ...

... "The HP Data Center Environmental Edge solution offers a complete visual mapping of environmental variables so customers can quickly identify and take action on data center inefficiencies. " ...

Via HP: Scale-out Computing

Efficient Enterprise Servers

The EPA is engaging industry in collaboration on revision of its EnergyStar specification for servers. The final draft is posted here (PDF). Comments on this revision are due by May 8 (this Friday). ...

... "Enterprise Servers: EPA is currently developing a new product specification for enterprise servers. Partners and other interested parties who would like to participate in this process are encouraged ... " ...

Via US Environmental Protection Agency: ENERGY STAR Specification for Enterprise Servers

Google Data Center Efficiency

Tour Google's efficient container data center ...

Performance Benchmarks

Activity in benchmarking energy consumption is increasing, as business seeks to understand their performance versus peers and to highlight leadership positions with management. ...

... "We’re beginning to wrap up the data collection phase for data centers and we will begin exploring the development of a data center energy performance rating. " ...

Via CoStar Group: ENERGY STAR

Night of the Living Dead

Finish that upgrade or implementation project? Didja retire the legacy system or infrastructure that it replaced? Oops. You've got zombies. And, they're costing you ... big-time. ...

... "I'm talking about zombie servers, machines that, for whatever reason, have been left in the rack, powered on but doing very little or no work whatsoever. " ...

Via InfoWorld: Slay your zombies

Sleep When Idle

Microsoft focuses some of its investment on energy efficiency in the data center. Reducing power consumption during server idle periods is a research topic. Microsoft Research on efficient datacenters: "selectively putting idle servers into a low-power state ... " ...

... "As of today, turning servers off and on automatically is difficult to do, but with growing interest in environmental sustainability and a need to reduce rising energy costs, more people and businesses are motivated to find and develop solutions that work. " ...

Via Microsoft: Sustainable Computing

Green Networks and Devices

Devices connected to networks are a significant source of energy inefficiency. Cisco targets energy monitoring and building management through its intelligent network offering. Sustainable IT needs to look beyond the data center. ...

... "Cisco EnergyWise is part of the company's technology roadmap for changing the value-chain of information technology (IT) by placing the intelligent network squarely at the center of how companies reduce greenhouse gas (GhG) emissions across their entire organization. " ...

Via Cisco: Green Network

Green Performance Monitoring

Google uses standard data center efficiency metric to monitor performance, identify opportunities for improvement, and track the impact of its actions. The trends are impressive and efficiency gains drop straight to their bottom line. ...

... "We achieve this result without the use of any exotic techniques the EPA report assumes are necessary to reach this level of efficiency. Individual facilities can return even lower PUE values, with at least one facility returning a TTM PUE of 1.15. Our lowest published quarterly average PUE of an individual facility is 1.12, meaning that all electrical losses and cooling overhead combined used just 12% of the IT load. We believe that each of these data centers ranks among the most efficient large data centers currently in operation today. " ...

Via Google : Green Data Center Trends

Integrated Thinking for Green Computing

The information technology industry can take advantage of low-hanging fruit to make their data centers more efficient in the short-term. However, in the long-run, a holistic, integrated view of the data center design will yield leading energy performance. ...

... "For instance, a strict policy should be in place for selecting UPS providers, floor systems or high co-efficient of performance chillers, which work efficiently in combination. " ...

Via Silicon Republic: Data Center Energy Saver

Technology Lifecycle

In business cases, we consider the one-time project costs and the recurring impact on operating budgets. With green computing on our agenda, a lifecycle perspective is needed for technology investments. We have to manage the disposition of those assets when decommissioned, which is long after the project is over. Dell's sustainability leader shares his thoughts. ...

... "Energy efficiency is just one component. They're also asking about materials and end of life. Commercial customers put asset tags on these machines, so they want to know that the materials can be recycled properly ... " ...

Via Forbes: Green Machine

Dell LED Strategy for Energy Efficiency

Dell implements transition to LED laptop displays which will impact energy consumption as equipment is replaced. ...

... "Dell's 15-inch LED displays consume an average of 43 percent less power at maximum brightness, resulting in extraordinary cost and carbon savings. The company estimates customer savings of approximately $20 million and 220 million kilowatt-hours in 2010 and 2011 combined, the equivalent of annual CO2 emissions resulting from energy use of more than 10,000 homes1. Dell also estimates that at least 80 percent of its total laptop volume will be delivered with LED as a standard back-lit display by the end of 2009 and 100 percent in 2010. " ...

Via Dell: Energy-Efficient LED Displays

Microsoft Texas Data Center Builds on Lessons Learned

Microsoft opens new data center as it executes on its cloud-computing strategy, incorporating energy efficiency into the design and operation of the facility. ...

... "The San Antonio facility is the most power-efficient data center we’ve built to date. The facility will use 602,000 gallons of recycled waste water (from San Antonio’s waste water system) a day to cool the facility during peak cooling months or approximately 8 million gallons of water a month. " ...

Via Microsoft: Microsoft San Antonio data center

PC Energy Footprint

Considering a project proposal for energy efficiency in the data center? Don't forget your personal computers and peripherals as an opportunity to reduce your energy footprint. ...

... "PCs and related peripherals consumed 41% of the information and communication technology's global footprint – telecoms infrastructure, data centers, and printers consumed 37%, 14% and 8%, respectively. " ...

Via Forrester: PC Power Management

Green Data Center Project

Emerson will eat its own dog food to achieve LEED Silver rating for its new green data center in St. Louis, which will support a program to consolidate its global data centers. ...

... "We've been telling our customers that the data center needs to be flexible, reliable and operate at the lowest total cost of ownership, said Victor Lee, chief technology officer for Emerson Network Power. This project gives us a chance to implement the strategies and technologies we recommend to our customers, and will give us a chance to share our first-hand experience after being in their shoes. " ...

Via Emerson: State-of-the-Art Global Data Center

Packaging ReThink

Packaging redesign increases energy efficiency, operational efficiency and asset utilization with some degradation in customer usability. Stores offer change management to customers in order to ease the transition. Expect more of these changes as the new reality of energy and fuel costs drives industry actions. ...

... "The company estimates this kind of shipping has cut labor by half and water use by 60 to 70 percent. More gallons fit on a truck and in Sam's Club coolers, and no empty crates need to be picked up, reducing trips to each Sam's Club store to two a week, from five - a big fuel savings. " ...

Via NYTimes: Green Milk Jug

Green IT Forum in Feb

Green IT Forum is scheduled for February 28th in New York City. ...

... "The IDC Green IT Forum is designed for senior IT, technology, procurement and strategic planning executives tasked with managing the role of Green IT to effectively measure and capture market opportunities for energy efficient systems. " ...

Via IDC: Event Details

Green Data Center Expansion

IBM expands data center, emphasizing energy efficiency and green design. IT can play a role in reducing an enterprise's carbon footprint and energy costs. ...

... "IBM plans to install high density computing systems utilizing virtualization technology, along with its Cool Blue portfolio of energy efficient power and cooling technologies. These technologies, in conjunction with the energy efficient design and construction, will allow IBM to reduce its overall carbon footprint compared to standard data centers, and lessen the impact to the environment. " ...

Via IBM: IBM to Build $86 Million Energy Efficient Data Center in Boulder as Part of Project Big Green

Green Computing Project

Project looks to target significant energy efficiency in computing. ...

... "Dubbed Green Shift, the project will replace energy-absorbing PCs with greener alternatives in up to 10 cities by the end of 2009. " ...

Via Belfast Telegraph: Green Project