Improving energy efficiency in datacentres will require
a fundamental review of the way IT components consume power, a
leading engineering consultant has warned.
Speaking at a Datacentre Dynamics conference last week, Patrick
Fogarty, director of engineering at Norman Disney & Young, told delegates that
electricity transmission from power stations to individual server
components in datacentres was still very inefficient.
Research by Norman Disney & Young found that only 25% of
energy entering datacentres reaches core systems.
Fogarty said equipment manufacturers could reduce power usage
dramatically by making incremental improvements to tackle the
problem, including fine-tuning transformers, UPSs and cooling
systems to make optimal use of energy.
"Improving the energy efficiency in the power supply component
of a server will result in an overall improvement in electrical
consumption within the centre," said Fogarty.
IT directors and datacentre managers are coming under increasing
pressure to lower electricity consumption as power costs rise. Many
are finding it increasingly hard to source sufficient power in many
locations.
Analyst group Gartner has warned that during the next three
years most CIOs will experience constraints on datacentre floor
space and power that "could limit an IT organisation's ability to
grow as the business grows".
Gartner vice-president Rakesh Kumar said that unless the IT
industry and users address this issue, in five or six years there
could be insufficient electricity supplies to power UK
datacentres.
Part of the problem is that modern datacentres are increasingly
relying on high-density blade servers, which provide a
cost-effective way to add more computing resources without taking
up expensive floor space.
But the challenge is to secure enough power to support the
rising number of servers the datacentre can handle when using
blades.
Richard Edwards of the Butler Group has said the energy density
of IT equipment per cubic metre is 20 to 50 times what it was five
years ago, and still climbing.
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