24 DATA CENTRES


Carbon-cutting in data centres - looking at the practical proof behind efficiency savings


suggest there will be at least 50 billion connected devices by 2020. Increased intercon- nectivity, the rise of the ‘Internet of Things’, and the unstoppable shift towards Industry 4.0 ensure the demand for data, and all the energy required to safely store it, will continue to grow at a phenomenal rate. According to research from the Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI), data centres already consume 3% of the world’s total electricity supply and generate 2% of the planet’s greenhouse gas emissions. That’s the equivalent environmental footprint as the airline industry. Analysts argue the amount of energy data centres use doubles every four years, despite the huge advances in hardware which have been made in recent years. There are two main ways a


C


data centre consumes power. There’s the energy used to run the IT equipment such as the servers or uninterruptible power supply (UPS) units, plus the air conditioning required to keep all that machinery cool enough to function safely without risk of overheating. Electricity is a data


centre’s single biggest operating cost, accounting for anything from 25-60% of its total overheads, according to TechUK, the body which represents the British technology industry. In this age of hyperscale facilities which typically consume


Worldwide Independent Power June 2018 www.gmp.uk.com


onservative estimates by inde- pendent research body Software.org


Data centres in the UK already consume nearly 3 TWh of power a year and that requirement is only going to get greater. We’re heading into an era where administrators and managers are tasked with providing the considerably expanded capacity needed to meet these growing demands without an equivalent increase in electrical generation. Being able to do “more with less” isn’t now just desirable it’s becoming non-negotiable. Taking proactive steps to reduce energy consumption and cut


carbon emissions in the data centre makes sense not just from an environmental perspective, but from an economic one too, explains Chris Cutler, the Corporate Account Manager for Riello UPS. He points out that the hard-headed business benefits of upgrading to more efficient, less wasteful modern, modular UPS are clear, for data centres of all shapes and sizes.


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