Cloud services providers are making enormous strides in data center efficiency. Take, for instance, Microsoft. “Today, Microsoft delivers more than 200 online services to 1+ billion customers and 20 million businesses in over 76 markets worldwide,” posts Brian Janous, Utility Architect, Data Center Advanced Development, at the Microsoft Global Foundations Services Blog. And that takes a lot of […]
HP’s modular EcoPOD data center
HP’s taking its build-a-data-center business seriously. Today the company’s Converged Infrastructure division unveiled what it’s billing as “the world’s most efficient data center,” the HP POD 240a. Or the EcoPOD as the company has taken to calling it (a naming convention I fully support). As has become the norm for modular data center vendors, the […]
The Green Grid: Meet the new carbon and water data center metrics
The Green Grid took the wraps off two new metrics this week, carbon usage effectiveness (CUE) and water usage effectiveness (WUE), that will help data center operators paint a clearer picture of just how sustainable their facilities truly are. And just in time, too. As Facebook has discovered, a green data center is judged by […]
Gov’t data center consolidation’s hot, PUE’s not
For shame! According to CDW’s 2010 Energy Efficient IT Report, just 17 percent of the government IT managers surveyed (federal, state and local) currently track PUE (power usage effectiveness). A pity, but at least the vast majority, 79 percent in fact, are planning or are already in the midst of data center consolidation projects. Washington […]
Capgemini’s green data center scores a 1.08 PUE rating
Capgemini, a technology consulting and outsourcing firm, today laid claim to the distinction of having the world’s most energy efficient data center with a PUE of 1.08. Named Merlin and located in Swindon, UK, Capgemini took an existing facility and transformed it into a 30,000 square foot, Tier 3 green data center as part of […]
Gartner: Most big, new data centers to adopt PUE
By 2015, according to Gartner, 80 percent of new large data centers will be the using the power usage effectiveness (PUE) measurement devised by The Grid Grid to report on the efficiency of their operations. PUE is not perfect, and there are efforts underway to support and develop measurements that provide insight into the useful […]
Schneider upgrades APC InfraStruxure, gives green data centers some love
Schneider Electric, via its APC subsidiary, is making it easier for data center operators to get a handle on their energy consumption. The company’s InfraStruxure line of energy monitoring and management products just got some pretty significant upgrades. PUE! PUE! Foremost among them, at least for businesses trying to benchmark for IT efficiency, is InfraStruxure […]
Yahoo’s “chicken coop” data center finally opens
Yahoo’s chicken coop inspired data center in Lockport, NY near Buffalo is finally open for business. A departure from the “big box” look of most corporate data centers, Yahoo’s design allows for free-cooling, or the use of ambient temperatures to keep IT equipment cool for most of the year and save a bundle on energy […]
eBay’s Project Topaz: Anatomy of a $300 million green data center
Building, let alone operating, a Tier IV data center to support a business that transacts $2,000 per second — that’s over $172 million per day, $60 billion per year folks — sounds like the makings of a huge energy guzzler. But that’s not the case for Dean Nelson, eBay’s senior director of Global Data Center […]