Energy efficiency and operational risk in a "Datacenter" Roberto Egon Einrich, Cláudio Rodrigo Torres

Abstract

Medium and Large Data Center (DC) are large energy consumers, with increasing power density, mainly with the singular growth of usage of the WWW and the recent development of the “cloud” computing. The DC's owners, managers and operators have been primarily concerned with power and cooling, due to the important role of these resources in the operating costs and investments in facilities infrastructure. The environmental aspect of energy, ostensively consumed, is also a concern. This article lists and presents the key drivers of this concern and a brief description of a method and an indicator for the measurement of energy efficiency, widely used in DCs, the PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness). Technologies are also discussed, addressing sources of inefficiencies and losses, in regard to the possibilities of control and mitigation, opening the discussion for the development of methods for the energy efficiency optimizing, without affecting the reliability of the facilities (operational risk), that is the main characteristic of the infrastructure of a mission critical facility.