Verari Systems® Green IT White Paper
Green Leadership
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Table of Contents
I. Executive Summary ....................................................1 II. IT and Data Center Challenges and Trends in Energy Consumption..........................................................2 Current IT and Data Center Challenges .....................2 Current IT and Data Center Trends ............................2 Excerpts of EPA Report to Congress on Server and Data Center Energy Efficiency.................................4 Uptime Institute Review of EPA Report to Congress ...................................................................5 The Growing Green Gap .............................................6 III. PUE and DCiE Efficiency Measurements for Today’s Enterprise Class Data Centers .................................7 PUE Efficiency Measurement .....................................7 DCiE Efficiency Measurement and Comparison to PUE .................................................7 IV. Power, Cooling, and Space Efficiencies in IT and Data Centers ..................................................................8 V. Industry Leading Green IT Solutions from Verari......9 BladeRack 2 Building Block ......................................9 FOREST Container....................................................10 Patented Vertical Cooling Technology ......................11 VI. Verari Energy Credit Incentive Program ...............12 Energy Credit Incentive Program Origins .................13 Energy Certification Partners’ Responsibilities ........13 Participating Utilities in the Verari Energy Credit Incentive Program ................................................14 Benefits Summary of the Verari Energy Credit Incentive Program................................................................14 VII. Verari Financial Services’ (VFS) Green Leasing Program...................................................................15 Green Leasing Complements the Verari Energy Credit Incentive Program ................................................15 VIII. Summary ..............................................................15 IX. References .............................................................16
I. Executive Summary
IT managers are already paying attention to the return on investment associated with acquiring more energy efficient equipment, but the advantages of a green data center doesn’t stop there. Green data centers don’t just save energy and reduce overhead. They also improve community relations and foster healthy, eco-conscious environments by combining the most energy efficient equipment with welldesigned facilities (data centers). Perhaps the best example of this combination is the innovative FOREST container, truly a “data center in a box” with superior energy efficiency characteristics versus traditional brick-and-mortar data centers. While new technologies enable IT organizations to significantly increase the delivered computational performance per watt, the effects of expanding demand for growth is being felt in other parts of the organization, especially Facilities departments. According to market analyst Gartner, the growth in power demand is expected to result in 80% of data centers running at the maximum available power and cooling levels by 2010. Technology is not the gating factor to addressing the constraints faced by data centers, rather the intra- and inter-organizational behavior and structure are; especially, the limited interactions between IT and facilities departments. By cooperating with these departments, Verari and its energy consulting partners deliver an integrated, holistic, collaborative approach to IT and data center missions. Verari can greatly enhance how data centers are designed, built, and operated so as to maximize resources, increase energy efficiency and provide the levels of service needed by IT and lines of business.¹
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II. IT and Data Center Challenges and Trends in Energy Consumption Current IT and Data Center Challenges
In today’s IT department, control and reduction of expenses are top of mind. Concern for cost transcends typical IT variations such as company size and industry, and both capital and operating cost efficiencies are fundamental to any discussion about running and growing a business. This extends to costs for all business processes within a company and especially to costs in the IT organization. However, the IT organization may not be able to identify expenses as precisely as other business units. Primary expenses, such as the cost of hardware and software licenses, are relatively easy to identify. However, secondary expenses, such as hardware cabling costs, facilities charges, and the personnel hours needed to configure and manage systems, are often not accounted for with precision. Tertiary expenses, which include the cost for service, maintenance, and retirement of old servers, are rarely allocated when estimating the total cost of ownership (TCO) for a new IT investment. Typically, IT organizations will track the costs of infrastructure acquisition and operation over time so that they can make important decisions about capacity planning and computer acquisitions going forward. IT planners primarily use oneyear, three-year, and five-year time horizons when conducting capacity planning for their computing systems. A cost analysis can be highly useful in relation to IT build-out in several ways. First and foremost, it can help IT organizations identify the true cost of architectures for their small server rooms before they invest in infrastructure components. Second, and equally important, cost analysis can assist IT management in setting realistic expectations for how much investment the complete build-out of an IT solution will require, in terms of both hard costs (i.e.,
hardware, software, and services) and soft costs (i.e., personnel time, downtime, and maintenance). It is incumbent upon IT managers, however, to gather the financial metrics associated with technology deployments. While members of finance or accounting departments can be helpful, only IT personnel can understand fully the total amount of time and materials that must be accounted for. As a result, IT personnel need to have a strong understanding of TCO and all that goes into its analysis. Overall, IT organizations must pay attention to the technical and business implications of their deployment plans. From the business perspective, these implications include identifying and quantifying the system life cycle, costs of IT staffing, and the ever-decreasing supply of resources to pay for additional system administrators.²
Current IT and Data Center Trends
Gartner estimates that 70% of all data centers will go through some sort of modification in the next five years. IDC predicts that more than 40% will be replaced within the next ten years; 17% within the next five years. The Data Center Institute has five bold predictions for data center trends: • By 2015, the talent pool of qualified senior level technical and management data center professionals will shrink by 45%. • By 2010, more than half of all data centers will have to relocate to new facilities or outsource some applications. • Over the next five years, power failures and limits on power availability will halt data center operations at more than 90% of all companies. • By 2010, nearly 70% of all data centers will utilize some form of grid computing or other virtual processing. • Within the next five years, one out of every four data centers will experience a business disruption serious 2
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enough to affect the entire company’s ability to continue business-as-usual. Driven by the sheer amount of consumed electrical power and related year-over-year increases, growing scrutiny is being placed upon electrical efficiency in data center applications. In the year 2000, servers and their associated cooling equipment in the United States (not counting network and storage equipment) consumed approximately 23 billion kWh. By 2005, this figure had risen to 45 billion kWh, accounting for 1.2% of all 2005 U.S electricity sales. The total magnitude of data center energy consumption, including network and storage equipment, is now estimated to be between 1.5% and 3% of all electricity generated. This increased energy consumption means greater expense. Currently, the typical 3-year cost (operating expenses + amortized capital expenses) of powering and cooling servers is approximately 1.5 times the cost of the server hardware itself, with projections of up to 22 times by the year 2012. The reason for increased energy consumption in the data center is, simply put, an increased demand for computing power. Typical server computing throughput per watt has increased by a factor of 16 from 1999 to 2007. An increased need for network storage is also a factor. An exacerbating factor for the increase in energy consumption is the trend toward increasing load density in the computer room. At the end of 2005, the average enterprise data center gross computer room heat density was 32 Watts/square foot, an average increase of 39% over 1999 levels. This is a result of advances in semiconductor technologies that yield smaller chips, along with advances in server technology --- such as the advent of blade servers --- that together allow more computer equipment to be packed into the same physical footprint. Since the heat generated by computer equipment must be removed in order to avoid overheating,
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increased computer load density results in increased heat density, which becomes a challenge for the HVAC equipment design. This trend is expected to continue.³ Additionally, Michelle Bailey from IDC (2007) has identified these specific mission-critical applications that are driving IT energy consumption and the need for increased data services: • Healthcare moving to electronic medical records. • Manufacturing organizations. • Banking migrating away from paper-based business models (e.g., online banking). • Financial services moving to digital transactions. • Insurance database needs growing. • Retail moving toward real-time inventories and supply chain management. • Transportation moving toward global positioning system (GPS) navigation and radio-frequency identification (RFID) tracking. IT is being asked to do more with less, while providing improved service levels to their customers and internal lines of business. In order to be competitive, IT must: • Improve performance and predictable operations. • Consolidate IT resources to reduce stranded assets. • Reduce complexity by implementing more modular designs. • Increase energy and space efficiencies. • Increase IT resource utilization through virtualization technologies. • Respond faster to business needs. • Improve service levels with scalable capacity planning. • Strengthen business continuity and recovery practices. • Improve IT personnel productivity by reducing IT complexity. 3 moving to global networked
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• Increase security due to increasing regulations or compliance laws. • Increase control with better management tools. By the same token, the design trends in data centers must meet these criteria to meet customer and lines of business demands: • Modular, repeatable design. • Scalable capacity planning. • Rapid deployment for added capacity as needed. • Quick Time-To-Market (TTM) of new, more productive technologies. • Easier disaster recovery mobility. • High availability. • Highest density given scarcer real estate. • Energy efficiency.
that was consumed for this purpose in 2000. One type of server, the volume server, was responsible for the majority (68 percent) of the electricity consumed by IT equipment in data centers in 2006. The energy used by this type of server more than doubled from 2000 to 2006, which was the largest increase among different types of servers. The power and cooling infrastructure that supports IT equipment in data centers also uses significant energy, accounting for 50 percent of the total consumption of data centers. Among the different types of data centers, more than one-third (38 percent) of electricity use is attributable to the nation’s largest (i.e., enterprise-class) and most rapidly growing data centers. Incentives and Voluntary Programs to Promote Energy Efficiency To realize the potential benefits from greater energy efficiency in the nation’s data centers, a number of market barriers need to be addressed. The adoption of energy efficient technologies and practices is often impeded by barriers such as higher first cost, lack of knowledge, institutional failures, and perverse incentives, and these issues apply equally to data centers. The barriers that prevent data centers from adopting changes that offer very reasonable paybacks are typically not technological but organizational. Three barriers to improved energy efficiencies in data centers are: 1) Lack of efficiency definition It is difficult to define energy efficiency for a complex system such as a data center or a server. “Energy efficient” is usually defined based on the delivery of the same or better service output with less energy input, but for servers and data centers service output is difficult to measure and varies among applications. Data center operators need standard definitions of productivity in order to purchase energy efficient equipment, operate it 4
Excerpts from the EPA Report to Congress on Server and Data Center Energy Efficiency (August 2, 2007) 4
Energy Use in Data Centers Through 2011 The energy used by the nation’s servers and data centers is significant. It is estimated that this sector consumed about 61 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) in 2006 (1.5 percent of total U.S. electricity consumption) for a total electricity cost of about $4.5 billion. This estimated level of electricity consumption is more than the electricity consumed by the nation’s color televisions and similar to the amount of electricity consumed by approximately 5.8 million average U.S. households (or about five percent of the total U.S. housing stock). Federal servers and data centers alone account for approximately 6 billion kWh (10 percent) of this electricity use, for a total electricity cost of about $450 million annually. The energy use of the nation’s servers and data centers in 2006 is estimated to be more than double the electricity
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in an optimal way, and design and operate the buildings to house it. 2) Split incentives In many data centers, those responsible for purchasing and operating the IT equipment are not the same people that are responsible for the power and cooling infrastructure, who in turn typically pay the utility bills. This leads to a split incentive, in which those who are most able to control the energy use of the IT equipment (and therefore the data center) have little incentive to do so. 3) Risk aversion With the increasing importance of digital information, data centers are critical to businesses and government operations. Thus, data center operators are particularly averse to making changes that might increase the risk of down time. Energy efficiency is perceived as a change that, although attractive in principle, is of uncertain value and therefore may not be worth the risk.
He defines four separate performance factors that define a green data center: 1) IT hardware productivity IT managers should ask themselves, “How can I maximize the fraction of my IT equipment that is employed productively and fully utilized?” 2) Maximum computational performance per unit of internal power IT personnel who select platforms should ask themselves, “How can I select hardware that delivers the most effective computing performance per Watt of internal power used?” 3) Efficient delivery of power at the plug to internal IT hardware components IT procurement personnel should ask themselves, “How can I select IT equipment that delivers input power to its internal components most efficiently?” 4) Efficient Site Infrastructure Facilities managers should ask themselves, “How can I maximize the amount of useful power delivered to IT equipment, for each unit of power consumed at the utility meter?” Kenneth Brill concludes, “Some of these groups will be new cross-functional teams formed within IT and data center user organizations. Others will be in the IT hardware vendor community, the site infrastructure hardware vendor community, and the data center design and engineering community. Optimization of each individual performance factor, in turn, will result in optimization of the whole system.” 6
Uptime Institute Review of EPA Report to Congress and Key Characteristics of a Green Data Center
Kenneth G. Brill, Founder and Executive Director of The Uptime Institute, believes that the EPA report “deserves to be a clarion call to all stakeholders involved in the server computing and data center industry to now take the greening of the data center seriously. Energy efficiency is an environmental and IT economic productivity imperative that can no longer be ignored.”
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The Growing Green Gap
In Greg Schulz’s latest book, “The Green and Virtual Data Center,” he makes an insightful point regarding the “green gap”, or disconnect, between environmental themes such as greenhouse gases, and IT data center issues around energy efficiency. “When I ask IT professionals whether they have or are under direction to implement green IT initiatives, the number averages below 20%. However, when I ask the same audiences who has or sees power, cooling, floor space, or environmental health and safety-related issues, the average is 80-90%.” As the graphic demonstrates below,
IT organizations have not been focusing on being perceived as green, but instead have been more narrowly focused on non-green or “economic” power, cooling, and space issues. Mr. Schulz stresses that green and non-green initiatives should go hand-in-hand: “By addressing IT issues today that include power, cooling, and floor space along with asset disposal and recycling, the by-products are economic and ecologically positive. Likewise, the shift in thinking from power avoidance to more efficient use of energy helps from both economic and ecological standpoints.” 7
Ecological
Messaging
Focus on greenhouse gases Carbon credit offsets Ecological sustainment Power avoidance Save money Global
The Green Gap
Emissions Electrical Power
Primary, Standby Backup
Economic
Issues
Concerns with available power Energy rebates and certificates Economic sustainment Energy efficiency Cost to be green Local
Green
Cooling and Floor Space
Limits on electrical G&T Rising energy costs and availability Aging and expensive infrastructure Emission tax schemes regulations
Environmental Health and Safety
Growing data footprint More servers and storage Increase density, reduce cost Removal of hazardous substance (RoHS)
Supply
Balancing Act
Demand
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III. PUE and DCiE Efficiency Measurements for Today’s Enterprise Class Data Centers PUE Efficiency Measurement “While PUE is a nice place to start, it is only part of the full story. The PUE’s dirty little secret lies with the way fans are measured. The PUE measurement places a system’s fans on the good side of the ledger as IT equipment, when in fact it should be on the bad side as IT infrastructure. Customers just aren’t getting the big picture.”
David Driggers Chief Technology Officer and Co-founder, Verari Systems A well-respected IT energy expert, Jonathan G. Koomey, Ph.D., of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) and Stanford University, assumes an average value of 2.0 for the ratio of total data center energy use to total IT equipment energy use to account for the energy use of site infrastructure systems. This ratio is often referred to as the “power usage effectiveness” (PUE) ratio. The PUE ratio estimate of 2.0 was based on recent energy use benchmarking studies of 22 data centers performed by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Greenberg et al. 2006, Tschudi et al. 2003). A PUE ratio of 2.0 was assumed to be the average value across all U.S. data centers; however, the PUE ratio can vary widely among individual data centers depending on infrastructure equipment configurations and efficiencies, time of year, and local climate (AFCOM 2007, Emerson Network Power 2007). 8
The IT Equipment Power is defined as the equipment that is used to manage, process, store, or route data within the data center. It is important to understand the components for the loads in the metrics, which can be described as follows: IT Equipment Power This includes the load associated with all of the IT equipment, such as compute, storage, and network equipment, along with supplemental equipment such as KVM switches, monitors, and workstations/laptops used to monitor or otherwise control the data center. Total Facility Power This includes everything that supports the IT equipment load such as: – Power delivery components such as UPS, switch gear, generators, PDUs, batteries, and distribution losses external to the IT equipment. – Cooling system components such as chillers, computer room air conditioning units (CRACs), direct expansion air handler (DX) units, pumps, and cooling towers. – Compute, network, and storage nodes. – Other miscellaneous component loads such as data center lighting. The PUE and DCiE provide a way to determine: – Opportunities to improve a data center’s operational efficiency. – How a data center compares with competitive data centers. – If the data center operators are improving the designs and processes over time. – Opportunities to repurpose energy for additional IT equipment.
DCiE Efficiency Measurement and Comparison to PUE
Data center Infrastructure Efficiency (DCiE) is the reciprocal of the PUE efficiency measurement. Here’s how the equations differ: – The PUE is defined as: Total Facility Power IT Equipment Power
– Its reciprocal, DCiE, is defined as: 1 PUE = IT Equipment Power x 100% Total Facility Power
According to a Green Grid White Paper published in 2007:9 “Total Facility Power is defined as the power measured at the utility meter — the power dedicated solely to the data center (this is important in mixed use buildings that house data centers as one of a number of consumers of power).
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For example, if a PUE is determined to be 3.0, this indicates that the data center demand is three times greater than the energy necessary to power the IT equipment. In addition, the ratio can be used as a multiplier for calculating the real impact of the system’s power demands. For example, if a server demands 500 watts and the PUE for the data center is 3.0, then the power from the utility grid needed to deliver 500 watts to the server is 1500 watts. DCiE is quite useful as well. A DCiE value of 33% (equivalent to a PUE of 3.0) suggests that the IT equipment consumes 33% of the power in the data center.” The Green Grid further clarifies energy efficiency measurement definitions: “Total Facility Power is measured at or near the facility utility’s meter(s) to accurately reflect the power entering the data center. This should represent the total power consumed in the data center. The data center-only portion of a building utility meter should be measured since power not intended to be consumed in the data center would result in faulty PUE and DCiE metrics. For example, if a data center resides in David Driggers Chief Technology Officer and Co-founder, Verari Systems an office building, total power drawn from the utility will be the sum of the Total Facility Power for the data center, and the total power consumed by the non-data center offices. In this case the data center administrator would have to measure or estimate the amount of power being consumed by the non-data center offices (an estimate will obviously introduce some error into the calculations). IT Equipment Power would be measured after all power conversion, switching, and conditioning is completed and before the IT equipment itself. The most likely measurement point would be at the output of the computer room power distribution units (PDUs). This measurement should represent the total power delivered to the compute equipment racks in the data center.
The PUE can range from 1.0 to infinity. Ideally, a PUE value approaching 1.0 would indicate 100% efficiency (i.e. all power used by IT equipment only). Currently, there are no comprehensive data sets which show the true spread of the PUE for data centers. Some preliminary work indicates that many data centers may have a PUE of 3.0 or greater, but with proper design a PUE value of 1.6 should be achievable. This theory is supported by measurements completed by Lawrence Berkeley National Labs study which shows that the 22 data centers measured had PUE values in the 1.3 to 3.0 range. Other research indicates that PUE values of 2.0 are achievable with proper design. However, there is currently no comprehensive industry data set that shows accurate PUE statistics for data centers. Furthermore, there is no general agreement on what constitutes an efficient or inefficient data center. In the future the Green Grid will offer values that profile target PUE and DCiE metrics for a variety of typical data center configurations.” 10 In the short term, The Green Grid suggests that data center owners begin using either the PUE or DCiE metrics. The Green Grid also encourages data center owners to share and compare their respective PUE and/or DCiE results, which will help each data center owner to analyze their measurement methodology better as well as understand how their results compare to the rest of the industry.
“If the system is greener by nature, it is using less power. If it is using less power, then it is less expensive to operate. A green solution is not only ecofriendly but will dramatically lower your power and cooling costs.”
IV. Power, Cooling, and Space (Density) Efficiencies in Verari Data Centers
The top three concerns of CIOs are availability of power, cooling capabilities, and space (density) constraints whereby denser form factors can provide considerable operational advantages, especially in urban areas. Verari offers compelling solutions in these areas as well and below is a brief description.
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Power The BladeRack 2 X-Series platform is the most energy efficient solution available on the market today. It takes 480VAC directly from street-to-rack with no facility PDU needed, which delivers clean, reliable power and increases overall efficiency. Since the platform is fully compatible with existing data center power structures that support 208VAC, customers can choose between 480VAC and 208VAC infrastructures. A watt saved in power consumption equals a watt saved in cooling. Therefore, at up to 85% total efficiency, the BladeRack 2 X-Series is extremely power efficient since the competition can only supply a 60% power efficiency level. This enables the best data center TCO in the industry due to better energy efficiency. Cooling The only vendor with patented Vertical Cooling Technology™ made specifically to solve data center cooling problems. A high velocity stream of cool air (up to 3500 CFM) drives away the hot air created by high performance components. Our BladeRack X-Series 2 platform works in data centers with or without raised floors, and can be placed in nearly any location or environment. Most cluster installations (e.g. HP, IBM, Dell) utilize traditional front-to-back cooling. This creates hot and cold air aisles in the data center and causes hot spots that lead to throttle-down or system failure. For example, when the thermal load gets too high, the chips throttle down to a lower cycle time in order to consume less power and, in turn, generate less heat. By providing a superior cooling solution, Verari rarely throttles down, which sustains higher performance. Density No competitor is capable of providing the same amount of processing performance or storage capacity in the same amount of square footage as Verari. This means Verari
®
provides the densest solution available on the market today. Utilizing cooling and power management capabilities of the BladeRack 2 X-Series platform, Verari supports up to 96 blade nodes per rack or 864 cores of pure processing performance, plus Verari has the highest storage density available with up to 672TB of storage capacity per rack.
V. Green IT Solutions from Verari Verari BladeRack 2 Building Block
Verari offers effective, innovative green IT solutions for today’s IT and data center needs. By far the best thing to do in order to save energy is to cut energy usage. With the BladeRack 2 X-Series and FOREST container solution, overall energy usage is drastically reduced versus our rackmount and blade competitors. To lower overall node power, the BladeRack 2 X-Series and FOREST container solution utilizes a combination of ultra-efficient power supplies and our patented Vertical Cooling Technology. The ultimate Green Data Center is realized when deploying the Verari FOREST Container solution populated with the BladeRack 2 X-Series, which can improve data center efficiency by more than 100%. Using larger, more efficient fans to control airflow in the BladeRack 2, a Verari Systems blade server will use approximately 50 watts less power per node than the typical fans used by even our most efficient rackmount competitors. Those 50 watts are amplified even more as a smaller total power number per node results in less heat generated, and less power needed by HVAC systems to cool heat produced. In addition, by utilizing Verari’s patented Vertical Cooling Technology integrated within the BladeRack 2 platform, the power used by the HVAC units will be used to cool your servers, not your room. It’s estimated that in most data centers, the majority of power used goes to COOL
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rather than compute. The BladeRack 2 radically improves this number, especially when server and/or storage blades are virtualized. The energy efficient Verari architecture also includes the power distribution in the rack. IT managers are already paying attention to the return on investment associated with acquiring more energy efficient equipment, but the advantages of a green data center do not stop there. Green data centers don’t just save energy and reduce overhead; they also improve community relations and provide healthy, eco-conscious environments.
• Planned technology refreshed can be implemented as needed, reducing risks of business disruption and IT obsolescence. • IT staff productivity improves due to a tightly controlled and optimized environment. • FOREST’s modular architecture allows customers to add data center capacity only as their business requires, so costs related to over-provisioning are eliminated. • Due to its transportability, customers no longer need to budget for real estate acquisitions and construction, so funds can be spent on more strategic IT projects. • Convenient management software enables IT administrators to monitor and regulate how much power and cooling compute/storage blades consume to optimize energy efficiency. • FOREST can be deployed and supported globally, indoors or outdoors, in an eco-friendly manner.
FOREST Container
The FOREST container is the highest density, most energy efficient containerized data center solution in the industry, architected for optimal flexibility to meet specific business and IT needs. FOREST delivers additional compute/storage capacity for mission critical applications when and where customers need it. Scalable to up to 2,000 servers or 13 petabytes of storage, FOREST’s energy efficient and modular, flexible design provides a superior TCO and ROI for these reasons: • Deployment time (plan/design/build) is reduced by an order of magnitude. FOREST can be up and running in as little as 10% of the time of traditional brick-and-mortar data centers. • Faster Time-To-Market (TTM), thanks to its ComponentsOff-The-Shelf (COTS) architecture, means increased competitiveness. • Compute/storage capacity can be deployed with about 50% of the capital expense and 50% of the ongoing operating expense of a traditional data center, resulting in significant TCO and ROI advantages.
Figure 1. Verari BluePrint™ airflow simulation demonstrates the energy efficient design of the FOREST containerized data center
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Patented Vertical Cooling Technology™
The BladeRack 2 was built specifically to solve the data center cooling problem. Verari Systems patented Vertical Cooling Technology is a cooling system that creates a high velocity stream of air driving away hot air created by high performance components and power supplies. Many cluster installations utilize traditional front to back cooling, which creates hot and cold air aisles in the data center as well as causing hot spots that lead to system failure. Front to back cooling draws cool air in through the front of the server and pushes it out the back. Unfortunately, because heat rises, the cool air becomes warm as it enters the upper rack, resulting in inefficient system cooling. This method of cooling also wastes valuable data center real estate by requiring empty rows for cooling and heating.
Patented Vertical Cooling Technology in the BladeRack 2 is driven by four levels of fans to maintain intense airflow. The fans used by the BladeRack 2 to initiate vertical cooling are truly cutting edge. These 120mm fans are more efficient at moving air than the smaller fans commonly found in server racks and require less wattage per node. Using larger, more efficient fans to control airflow in the BladeRack 2 X-Series platforms, a Verari Systems blade server will use approximately 50 watts less power per node than the typical fans used by even our most efficient rackmount competitors. Those 50 watts are amplified even more as a smaller total power number per node results in less heat generated and less power is needed by HVAC systems to cool the heat produced. In addition, by utilizing Verari’s patented Vertical Cooling Technology integrated within the BladeRack 2 X-Series, the power used by the HVAC units will be used to cool servers, not the data center.
Figure 2. Traditional front-to-back air flow With standard air flow, upper-level blades generally receive less cooling than those at bottom of the rack. Hot rows and less-than-fully-packed racks waste space, and the lack of even cooling increases failure rates.
Figure 3. Verari Systems’ patented Vertical Cooling Technology Verari’s exclusive cooling technology pulls air up into the cabinet, bathing all blades in cool air and increasing density and reliability.
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VI. Verari Energy Credit Incentive Program
Announced January 13, 2009, Verari’s Energy Credit Incentive Program provides a simple, convenient cash rebate program for customers planning to install energy efficient BladeRack 2 X-Series or FOREST container solutions. The Energy Credit Incentive Program rewards customers who plan to install new energy efficient IT equipment and/ or cooling systems, such as the BladeRack 2 X-Series platforms or the FOREST container, both architected with Verari’s patented Vertical Cooling Technology. Verari’s Energy Credit Incentive Program makes it easier for customers to apply and qualify for various energy rebates offered by utilities in their respective coverage areas. To be a responsible corporate citizen, Verari is committed to protecting and respecting the environment through ecofriendly operations, product engineering, and data center design. The Energy Credit Incentive Program represents a major step forward in enhancing Verari’s commitment to green IT and to the environment. Administering energy credit incentives for our customers not only provides a compelling economic value and energy efficiency, but it’s a service that customers need. The Energy Credit Incentive Program offers a convenient application process to businesses keen on minimizing their data center energy costs and greenhouse gas (CO2) emissions. Once future energy savings are calculated using standardized metrics for Verari equipment and the application is approved by the participating local utility, customers are eligible for a maximum energy credits (rebates) ranging from $500,000 to $2,400,000 for a single site. In the past, data center designers and operators focused on data center reliability, not on energy efficiency. Today, since
data center power density is leading to power and cooling limitations, there’s significant interest in energy efficiency as a potential solution to these problems. Verari’s ecoleadership helps customers cost-justify acquisition of the most energy efficient IT, which saves customers significant dollars. In addition, Verari Financial Services’ (VFS) Green Leasing Program complements the Energy Credit Incentive Program by ensuring that the equipment is refreshed periodically so customers maintain the most energy efficient equipment and dispose of older assets eco-responsibly. Since the energy rebates can be applied to VFS leases for new equipment, customers can benefit from lower monthly payments. Why are power utilities offering energy credit incentives (cash rebates) to customers if they can charge potentially more for additional power consumption? • Power utilities can’t build new power plants fast enough to meet demand. • License approvals for new power plants are consistently being rejected by regulatory authorities due to environmental concerns regarding toxic CO2 emissions. For example, one hundred fifty (150) requests for new power plant construction have been cancelled in the last several years due to environmental concerns and regulations. • Utilities would prefer, therefore, to defer CapEx and encourage customers to remove less efficient IT equipment and replace it with new, more energy efficient IT equipment (i.e., BladeRack 2 or FOREST Container). • CapEx to build greenfield power plants is $2-3 billion on average. This is not only expensive, but this takes a few years, and electricity demands of data centers need to be met today.
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Energy Credit Incentive Program Origins
Under their Non-Residential New Construction (NRNC) program, PG&E has led this energy savings initiative targeted to the IT industry. Over twenty utilities are emulating the PG&E program nationally, and many more plan to implement a program in 2009. The basis for the program is the Standard Performance Contract (SPC). SPC offers incentives to non-residential customers for installing new, high efficiency equipment or systems. For the period from 2009-2011, PG&E has reserved, for example, $50 million in energy credit incentives for data centers alone. Energy Credit Incentive Application Overview • A customer applies for energy credit incentive (rebate) prior to new Verari equipment installation. • An “energy savings calculator” is used to estimate the energy savings and resulting energy rebate based on the initial 12-month installation period of Verari equipment. • The energy savings calculator may be provided by the local utility, an energy certification partner, or by the customer. Measurements included must be consistent with the SPC guidelines. • No baseline analysis of existing IT equipment is required if PG&E’s Non-Residential New Construction (NRNC) program is used. Other utilities may vary. There are three eligible energy savings measurements for IT equipment, all of which can be combined: 1) IT Equipment Energy (Motors, Variable Speed Drives, Air Compression Systems) • Rebate is based on the first year’s energy savings calculated. • 9 cent incentive per kWh saved. • Varies by utility.
2) HVAC Energy (Air Conditioning & Refrigeration) • Rebate is based on the first year’s energy savings calculated. • 15 cent incentive per kW saved. • Varies by utility . 3) On-Peak Demand Reduction • New incentive in 2009. • Based on reduction of kWh during On-Peak Demand. • Varies by utility . Finally, maximum allowable energy incentive credits (cash rebates) offered by qualifying utilities will vary somewhat. PG&E, for example, offers a maximum rebate of $500,000; Southern California Edison offers a maximum rebate of $2,400,000.
Energy Certification Partners’ Responsibilities
Verari has selected energy certification partners to work with customers in validating their current IT electricity consumption, and to help customers calculate future electricity consumption with new, energy efficient Verari equipment. Other responsibilities include: • Perform all spreadsheet development, document assumptions, and produce an energy savings calculator according to utilities’ requirements (which will vary slightly from utility to utility). • Develop a lab validation report to describe Verari’s solution to utilities and justify the energy savings of Verari equipment, such as BladeRack 2’s and FOREST Containers. • Interface utilities to negotiate and obtain qualification for energy incentive rebates. • Assist customer in securing rebate check from utility. (Verari assists too.)
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Participating Utilities in the Verari Energy Credit Incentive Program
These are utilities that have applied for the program and are currently “active” or “pending” for approval as of February 2009. Currently, there are eight utilities with active, funded energy rebate programs. Verari will update this list as needed at http://www.verarifinancial.com/green.asp and click on the ‘Click here for Participating Utilities’ link. Coverage Area East of the Mississippi These Eastern utilities are pending: • Con Edison (NY Metro) • Duke Energy (OH, IN, KY) • Hydro Quebec (Quebec, Canada) • Madison Gas & Electric (WI) • National Grid (New England & NY) • NSTAR (MA) • PSE&G (NJ) • Virginia Dominion Power (VA, NC) Coverage Area West of the Mississippi These Western utilities are active: • PG&E (Northern CA) • S. California Edison (Southern CA) • SDG&E (San Diego) • Silicon Valley Power (Santa Clara) • SMUD (Sacramento) • Oncor (Dallas, TX) • Austin Energy (Austin, TX) • BC Hydro (Vancouver, British Columbia) These Western utilities are pending: • Ft. Collins Utility (Ft. Collins, CO) • Idaho Power (ID, OR, NV) • LA Dept. of Water & Power (Los Angeles) • Manitoba Hydro (Manitoba)
• Pacific Power (OR, WA) • Portland General Electric (Portland, OR) • Puget Sound Energy (WA) • Rocky Mountain Power (UT, WY, ID) • Seattle City Light (Seattle) • Xcel Energy (CO, MI, MN, NM, ND, SD, TX, WI)
Benefits Summary of the Verari Energy Credit Incentive Program
It’s not an overstatement to say that “everybody wins” with this program: Customers • Customers improve their data center efficiency and become more eco-responsible by minimizing their carbon emissions. • Customers save potentially tens of thousands of dollars thanks to energy rebates provided by their utility. • New IT equipment improves customers’ competitiveness and IT capacity, especially during on-peak demand. Utilities • Utilities avoid the CapEx for new power plant construction – billions and billions of dollars saved. • Utilities avoid the lengthy, costly regulatory approval process for new construction. • Utilities minimize their carbon emissions and, potentially, minimize federal carbon emissions taxes. Society at large • Minimizes greenhouse gases and other environmental toxins for a greener planet. Verari • Verari offers a compelling economic value proposition to customers by making it easier and more affordable for them to upgrade to energy efficient equipment. • Verari enhances their eco-friendly commitment and ongoing green initiatives.
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VII. Verari Financial Services’ (VFS) Green Leasing Program
Announced December 9, 2008, the VFS Green Leasing Program has three primary pillars: 1. Trade-in older IT assets for new, energy efficient Verari equipment. 2. Technology refresh program to maintain most current/ energy efficient assets. 3. Energy credits based on actual savings validated by selected energy certification partners and the local power utility (e.g., PG&E), using an energy savings calculator.
customers save significant dollars by utilizing energy efficient IT assets versus older/inefficient assets; Verari provides industry leadership in eco-friendly technology and market solutions based on BladeRack 2, FOREST, and convenient green lease financing. Plus, VFS offers the best interest rates and residual value positions on Verari equipment as well as flexible payment plans and green life cycle management services to reduce overall TCO.
VIII. Summary
Verari Systems recognizes effective environmental management as an important corporate priority, and we
Green Leasing Complements the Verari Energy Credit Incentive Program
After equipment needs are determined, our energy certification partners determine the forecast annual electricity savings during the first year that Verari equipment is installed. Conservative assumptions have identified that energy savings using Verari’s BladeRack 2 or FOREST container can be at least 25% versus competitive racks or brick-and-mortar data centers. An energy credit (cash check) is then offered by the local utility on a one-time basis. For example, an energy incentive credit is calculated for IT equipment based on 9 cents per kWatt-hour saved in the first year with new, energy efficient Verari equipment, which can result in a cash credit (upfront rebate check) of tens of thousands of dollars. Application rules apply for the incentive program and Verari or Verari Financial Services will work in conjunction with the customer and the local utility to coordinate the application process smoothly. When the upfront rebate is applied to a VFS lease, the energy incentive has the effect of an equity down payment, which reduces the monthly payments for the lease. Benefits accrue to all stakeholders: utilities do not need to invest in costly new plant capacity, thereby minimizing carbon emissions;
are actively involved in environmental innovations and technologies designed to support this priority. We are committed to protecting and respecting the environment through outstanding environmental performance and efficiency in the conduct of our operations and product engineering. Verari Systems works toward improving energy efficiency in building design and construction, energy conservation best practices in existing and future facilities, identifying opportunities in new and innovative programs offered through utility companies and with local, state, and national agencies, and on continuously raising energy awareness among Verari employees and customers. Bestin-class examples include the BladeRack 2 and FOREST container, both leading the IT industry in energy efficiency. Verari has extended its green practices by joining several organizations such as The Green Grid and the Silicon Valley Leadership Group. Organizations like this help to develop meaningful, platform-neutral standards, measurement methods, processes, and new technologies to improve energy efficient performance of global data centers. Verari Systems is a proud and contributing member of The Green Grid. The Green Grid is a global consortium dedicated to advancing energy efficiency in data centers and business
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computing ecosystems. Verari’s Executive VP of Products is a member of the Measure and Metrics subcommittee. The Green Grid is chartered to develop meaningful, platformneutral standards, measurement methods, processes, and new technologies to improve energy efficient performance of global data centers. For more information on The Green Grid, visit www.thegreengrid.org. As an affiliate of the Climate Savers Computing Initiative, Verari Systems is committed to using and encourages the use of power-management tools in the manufacturing of all blade-based and rackmount server offerings. Verari Systems’ corporate environmental policy assures that by manufacturing energy efficient servers per program criteria allows for more eco-friendly solutions to be developed and helps to remedy energy concerns facing today’s data center infrastructure. The Climate Savers Computing Initiative operates in a manner similar to the U.S. Government’s Energy Star program. It is intended to promote both the deployment of existing technologies and investment in new energy efficiency technologies. The Initiative starts with the 2007 Energy Star requirements and gradually increases the efficiency requirements over the next several years. For more information on the Climate Savers Computing Initiative, visit http://www.climatesaverscomputing.org. “Verari Systems was founded on the principle of ‘thinking green’ and defining a new era in high performance utility computing for the enterprise data center. Verari’s membership in The Green Grid, Climate Savers Computing Initiative and Silicon Valley Leadership Group tracks closely with our dedication to protecting the environment by developing
data center solutions engineered for maximum power efficiency, cooling, and density.” David B. Wright, CEO and Chairman of the Board, Verari Systems
IX. References
1.) The Green Grid: Addressing Organizational Behavior – Issues to Optimize IT and IT and Facilities Energy Efficiency, July 30, 2008. 2.) Blade Servers for the Masses: Cost Advantages in Midsize and Enterprise Markets, John Humphreys, IDC White Paper, January 2008. 3.) Tackling Today’s Data Center Energy Efficiency Challenges – A Software-Oriented Approach, by James Parker, PE, CEM, CMVP, Square D Engineering Services, Hugh Lindsay, Schneider Electric PMC Operations, Bill Brown, PE, Square D Engineering Services --- In Conjunction with the Square D Critical Power Competency Center. 4.) Report to Congress on Server and Data Center Energy Efficiency Public Law 109-431, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, ENERGY STAR Program, August 2007. 5.) Uptime Institute Opinion Paper, EPA Report Should Spur Industry-Wide Green Data Center Movement, by Kenneth G. Brill, Founder/Executive Director. 6.) Ibid. 7.) The Green and Virtual Data Center, Greg Schulz, Auerbach Publications, 2009. 8.) The Green Grid White Paper, The Green Grid Data Center Power Efficiency Metrics: PUE and DCiE, 2007. 9.) Ibid. 10.) Ibid.
Verari Systems 9449 Carroll Park Drive, San Diego, CA 92121 USA Phone 858-874-3800 or 888-942-3800 Web www.verari.com © 2009, Verari Systems, Incorporated. All Rights Reserved. Verari Systems, BladeRack, Vertical Cooling Technology and the Verari Systems logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Verari Systems Incorporated. All other names or marks are property of their respective owners. No part of this document may be reproduced without consent from Verari Systems Incorporated. Technical specifications subject to change without notice.
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