know how
Needs and wants T
Mike Elms of Uninterruptible Power Supplies reveals the features that UPS users need most – and how suppliers are providing them.
oday’s business and technical environment requires IT facilities to expect a great deal from their UPS. A recent
survey investigated these expectations; this article reviews the results, looks at how UPS vendors are responding, and suggests ways in which contractors can deliver a configuration best suited to a customer’s requirements.
Computer hardware has evolved from a useful productivity aid to an online ICT resource essential to most organisations’ survival. The role of uninterruptible power supplies (UPS) has accordingly become critical in protecting this resource from mains power interruptions. Yet even while UPS assume this increased responsibility, their users need them to do so more reliably and more efficiently than ever before. A recent survey investigated exactly which power issues concern data centre operators the most, and how they expect their UPS suppliers to respond. A look at the survey results and respondents’ priorities, and the UPS industry’s answers, offers pointers for achieving future proofed UPS configurations best suited to today’s business and technical pressures. Reliability is absolutely key because while critical loads have rapidly grown, mains power has become less reliable. Over 75 per cent of the survey respondents reported a power outage within the last 12 months, while 78 per cent believe the situation will worsen over the next 10 years. This belief has foundation, as 19GW of generating capacity will go by 2018.
Rising energy costs are another major concern to 80 per cent of respondents, and reduction of carbon footprint is also a growing priority as environmental legislation becomes punitive to non-compliant organisations. The survey shows that currently 63 per cent regard cost as their driver to reduce power consumption, while 27
per cent are driven by carbon footprint reduction. Users’ purchases of capital equipment are affected; 82 per cent of respondents regard energy efficiency as a key buying consideration. Nearly 54 per cent report that modern UPS systems, designed and manufactured with environmental considerations at their core, have significantly improved power consumption and cooling issues within their organisation. Transformerless technology drives modern UPS design. It immediately improves energy efficiency by around five per cent across the UPS’ whole load span, substantially reducing energy and cooling costs. Transformerless UPS also present a higher and more stable input power factor, which reduces input current and sometimes electricity costs. Transformerless implementations also offer significantly reduced size and weight. This has enormous implications for power protection, because UPS systems can become sets of rack mounting modules operating in parallel rather than monolithic floor standing units. Such configurations improve reliability through improved resilience to failure and improved availability. Resilience to failure is a property of N+1 redundant systems where the UPS can fully support the critical load even if one module fails. UPS availability increases because a faulty module can be quickly replaced, typically within about half an hour, compared with the six hours typically needed for component level diagnosis and repair. Additionally, battery reliability is improved through better charging circuitry.
Although these hardware improvements are welcome, they are not the whole story. Over 90 per cent of the survey’s respondents believe that maintenance and emergency call out services are as important as the hardware itself to their business. Accordingly, users should arrange a support package comprising both scheduled maintenance
and assured emergency response. Scheduled maintenance minimises the need for emergency call outs by spotting deteriorating components for replacement before failure. As a complete power protection installation often extends to a UPS, batteries and generator, it makes sense to use a single supplier who understands all of these, how they interact with one another and therefore how to provide an integrated power support strategy. An emergency call out service appropriate to the load’s criticality should be negotiated. Guaranteed on site response times should be set, backed by 24/7 telephone support and optionally by remote monitoring.
International standards define different aspects of service quality, and UPS suppliers should be certified for these. BSI EN ISO 9001:2008 covers quality management, ISO 14001 covers environmental management and OHSAS 18001 is for health & safety management. As well as confirming service quality, these certifications demonstrate that the supplier can manage the UPS user’s environmental and health and safety obligations during the equipment’s operational life and eventual disposal. The survey has shown how UPS users’ concerns reflect our current environment. Inexorable growth in data centre demand, coupled with increasing concerns about UK power grid availability lead users to value reliability highly, while viewing reliability as the sum of the equipment and its support. With rising energy costs and increasingly aggressive ‘green’ legislation, energy saving is also essential for economising and, to a lesser but significant extent, meeting carbon footprint reduction and social responsibility goals. Most of the respondents run carbon reduction policies and strategies investigating product efficiencies. Modern UPS technologies help users to achieve these goals, but the right choice of supplier is essential as well.
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