FOCUS 2010 REVIEW
Issue 13, Dec 10/Jan 11
2010: THE YEAR THE DATA CENTER WORLD CHANGED
From emissions to modularity, key concerns in 2010 were very different from what was predicted at the start of the year. So what about the year ahead? Here is what the experts had to say
Adil Attlassy VP of Engineering, Digital Realty Trust
What was the most important data center development of 2010? The
significant increase in awareness
of energy efficiency has been a critical step forward for our industry. From both a corporate social responsibility and a financial perspective, [awareness of] energy efficiency has continually increased to become a mainstream priority in 2010.
Tied in with the need to respond to legislation such as the Carbon Reduction Commitment, this change has led to a substantial increase in the monitoring of energy consumption.
What single advance will most positively impact the data center sector in 2011? The most important advance in 2011 won’t be a specific technology but a new mode of operating. Efforts to extract ever-more efficiency from the data center will continue: enterprises will increasingly operate outside the traditional class 1 or class 2 operating environment, with some in the ASHRAE- allowable environment.
This significant shift in mindset will be supported by increased adoption of technologies such as cold-aisle containment, and by intelligent management of workloads, where applications are prioritized based on criticality to the business. We will see financial justification for this new approach as businesses optimize their CapEx/OpEx model.
Christina Page Director of Climate and Energy Strategy, Yahoo!
What was the most important data center development of 2010? The industry has made considerable strides around free cooling. Everyone used to be afraid of it but now the next generation of data center design features facilities such as our Lockport data center, where the YCC (Yahoo! Computing Coop) design means the building itself is the air handling unit and we use exclusively free cooling over 99% of the year.
46
www.datacenterdynamics.com
What single advance will most positively impact the data center sector in 2011? Better, more accurate measurement of performance. That’s due to the convergence of a standard protocol for PUE, cheaper and more ubiquitous sensors, understanding of efficiency metrics that go beyond PUE and the maturing of some good data center management software tools.
David J Cappuccio Managing Vice President, Chief of Research, Gartner Research
What was the most important data center development of 2010? In 2010 it was finally realized that data centers are too big and under used. Compute assets
are underutilized and what I call
vertical densities in terms of rack densities and virtualized densities must be adopted to increase the productivity of data centers. Organizations started taking a serious look at the consumption ratios of compute power to energy consumed and then comparing them against estimated productivity of applications and the equipment.
What single advance will most positively impact the data center sector in 2011? The shrinking data center. Off loading of non critical IT and applications to providers. Enterprises will differentiate the use of the data center by deciding what computing functions are critical to the business and outsourcing the rest. The cloud has forced businesses to ask: can I move non-critical IT to a cloud provider and free up existing infrastructure? Ultimately once the decision is made it will enable enterprises to build and operate smaller data centers or retro- fit existing facilities. Inside the data center new skills will emerge and there will be the development of the liaison role between facilities and IT.
Tarif Abboushi PE VP Data Center Infrastructure, NTT America
What was the most important data center development of 2010? The most
important development in the
WHAT THE EXPERTS PREDICTED IN 2009 FOR 2010
• Target PUE values set by governments
• A move towards liquid cooled computers resulting in full-time economizer use regardless of climate
• Advancements in automation, offering a real-time view of the data center performance against design goals
• The convergence of IT and facilities
• Economic growth in the data center industry worldwide
• Wide-scale adoption of the EU Code of Conduct
• Growth in modular data center design •
Increase in devices with low power consumption
• Movement towards the elimination of Tier III and Tier IV redundancy
• Acceptance of non-traditional power and cooling technology
WHAT WE PREDICTED FEBRUARY 2009
Last February we predicted that metrics would be about more than power usage effectiveness (PUE). We said more metrics would rise to reflect the diversity of the data center industry, and we were right. This year has been the year new metrics have risen and people have started to take notice, creating debate around the validity of a global metric that fits all data center operations.
JUNE 2009
Our front cover – Carbon Tax – said it all. FOCUS’s cover story looked at research
unveiled highlighted by
DatacenterDynamics, which
the
mistrust, frustration and confusion surrounding the UK’s Carbon Reduction Commitment (now the Carbon Reduction Commitment Emissions Trading Scheme).
Our initial reaction to it? It is going to turn out to be a tax!
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60