New energy-efficent datacentre to save Yorkshire Water £90,000 a year

Datacentre solutions company 2bm has signed a contract with Yorkshire Water to design and build a new datacentre in Bradford.

The build will begin in the fourth quarter of this year.

The new datacentre will replace a 17-year-old facility and is expected to have a Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) rating of below 1.2 – the industry average is 2.5.

The PUE is a standard devised by the Green Grid Consortium and determined by dividing the amount of power entering a datacentre by the power used to run the computer infrastructure within it.

PUE is expressed as a ratio, with overall efficiency improving as the quotient decreases toward 1.

The datacentre will be made more efficient by using direct free cooling (DFC) as well as more effective air management and the use of aisle containment, it will also use less space as a result of deploying SAR cabinets, which 2bm developed in conjunction with IBM.

Tim Williams, IT project manager at Yorkshire Water, said: "We have calculated that this move will save us 32 tonnes of carbon a year and will save us approximately £90,000 per annum in terms of how much it costs to run the datacentre."

Much of this cost saving will be achieved by using DFC technology, which will reduce running costs compared with traditional chilled water and DX CRAC (Computer Rated Air Conditioning) systems.

DFC technology combines controlled external air with the mechanically generated hot air from the datacentre to create a server inlet temperature of 21C and humidity levels below 70 per cent (relative humidity).

The SAR server racks also provide benefits: the mesh doors aid airflow and the central infill section helps heat dissipation to increase server density.

The cabinets also allow for improved cable management as they require fewer floor cut outs. They also have power management aids such as metered mains and an intelligent power distribution unit monitoring the sockets.

This is all linked into software from Sensorium, which is used to monitor power and environmental conditions, collecting data from various devices within the datacentre and sending it to the IT department.

The new datacentre will initially house servers migrated from the old facility. This equipment has been upgraded every four years on a rotating basis, with 20 per cent refreshed per annum.

The company also said that it is looking to replace its core network, which is four years old, as well as its storage area network. Both tenders will be released within two months.