IT energy use doubles
IT equipment is failing to meet energy efficiency goals, according to new research.
The average computer server produces over 600kg of CO2 every year that could be avoided by better design, location and use of cooling. Servers now consume double the energy they did five years ago and, in the US, they are predicted to double energy usage again by 2011.
IT specialist Amenworld says emissions from computer rooms could be reduced by locating components more sensibly to boost cooling airflow through the computers, reducing the system's temperature and the amount of power consumed.
It adds that the “preventable carbon footprint” of servers in the UK is equivalent to over 2,500 jumbo jets making return flights to India.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, IT servers account for 1.5 per cent of total electricity use in the US.
A report produced by an American technology company says that 90 per cent of IT buyers care about energy efficiency, but most don’t know what to do about it.
"While energy efficiency has become a 'motherhood' value in IT, good information [about how to tackle it] is severely lacking," said CDW Corporation vice president Mark Gambill.
"The first step in reducing energy consumption is to know what you are spending, yet more than 40 per cent of technology professionals say they don't see their organisation's energy bill."
The UK government says that IT is responsible for 20 per cent of the carbon emissions generated by its own offices - around 460,000 tonnes a year – and it has implemented a four-year plan to make its equipment carbon neutral.
The air conditioning industry is under increasing pressure to find energy efficient ways of cooling IT rooms and data centres to reduce their carbon footprint.
“The IT world has to be the fastest moving of all the markets served by the air conditioning industry and it places particular demands on design engineers, who must balance a series of apparently conflicting issues,” says Mark Shutler, managing director of close control air conditioning specialist Denco.
“Data centres typically work on a two-year upgrade cycle and each time the equipment changes so do the cooling demands. Data centre cooling solutions must be flexible and adaptable on a scale not faced by any other air conditioning application.
“We are now faced with an array of high density racking systems for computer servers that are changed and rearranged almost continually. More and more computing power is being compressed into an ever smaller space and IT user demands are still rising,” he explains.
Air conditioning engineers wrestle with the problem of achieving ideal sensible cooling requirements by increasing airflow without driving up energy costs. Designers need to take this into account and not simply consider the cooling capacity of the units.
“The secret is to supply a lot of air into the conditioned space, but not at such a high pressure that you create turbulence and so reduce efficiency,” says Mr Shutler.
“Close control air conditioning is really the only solution for environments with a heavy IT load because they balance relative humidity and temperature as well as ensuring there is adequate, well controlled airflow to the occupied zones.”
However, office managers used to IT equipment shrinking in size while increasing in capacity now want air conditioning to do the same. They want small, discreet, silent boxes with low running costs, which is a stiff challenge for the industry.
“If you shrink the size of the duct, you have to accelerate the airflow and push up the pressure, which also drives up the energy cost and noise levels. There is no such thing as a very small box with a high cooling capacity – yet,” says Mr Shutler.
Close control air conditioning units can deliver the required critical temperature and humidity control while also cutting energy by making use of available ‘free cooling’, according to various design specialists.
The systems can exploit low average ambient temperatures to provide partial or full free cooling via a glycol water system. When the glycol is cooler than the room air, it passes through a free cooling coil before reaching the condenser, picking up heat directly from the room rather than the refrigeration system.
“This reduces the running time on the compressor saving energy and increasing the system’s operating life,” adds Mr Shutler. “Some degree of free cooling is available for 70 per cent of the year in Northern European countries thanks to our climate.”