Best Practices for Improving Multi-Tenant Data Center Efficiency

Over the past decade, Multi-Tenant data centers (MTDCs) averaged a 1.6 power usage effectiveness (PUE) globally, with many leading MTDCs achieving marginally lower PUE (1.4-1.5). However, cutting-edge “green” MTDCs have proven PUE figures as low as 1.15 is economically viable and achievable.

As worldwide energy prices hit record highs, MTDC operators are looking to identify power-saving opportunities. Even small changes can yield real results. Based on an average price of $0.15 per kWh, a 4MW facility can save more than USD$525,000 annually by improving PUE by 0.1.

In today’s blog, we will discuss technologies MTDCs can deploy to increase efficiency and improve their overall competitive position in the data center marketplace.

Take Your Cooling to the Next Level

One of the biggest power consumers inside the data center is cooling. Typically it will consume 20 percent to 40 percent of the overall power available. Innovations in CRAC/CRAH cooling technologies have been massive, and the latest generations tend to utilize water to provide the highest efficiencies throughout the year. In most locations, this will enable free cooling in winter and partial free cooling in summer. It also removes the need for large volumes of refrigerants, which can be used by the ton in some applications. Each kilo of refrigerant potentially represents more than 1000 kilos of CO2 in environmental damage, reducing refrigerant requirements can be a quick but powerful change.

Invest in Ultra-High Efficiency Cooling Technologies for Your Data Center

The next step is to elevate the water temperature while maintaining the room temperature within acceptable limits. This is achievable with a variety of methods, including in-row cooling, rear-door cooling, direct-to-chip cooling, and immersion technology. Each of these technologies allows for an increase in the water temperatures, potentially, without sacrificing the room temperature maintained.

Convert to a High-Efficiency, Multi-Mode UPS

If legacy UPSs and batteries are due for an update, the time may be right to consider a high-efficiency, multi-mode UPS. These include energy-saving “eco-modes” during normal conditions that can offer up to 99 percent power efficiency. The system will convert to inverter mode in milliseconds if utility-level power quality issues exist. This provides full power filtering and protection, though at lower efficiency. Additional benefits include harmonics mitigation, power factor correction, and load balancing, even while in eco-mode.

For highly sensitive ICT equipment, full inverter-mode operation may be required all of the time. High-performance modular UPS models offer up to 96 percent efficiency while in inverter mode.

Add Power Monitoring and DCIM-as-a-Service

Next-gen data center infrastructure management (DCIM) solutions support multi-tenancy. DCIM-as-a-Service can extend existing MTDC building management system (BMS) data to tenants, without the need of deploying individual systems. Access to data can be “locked down” to a single tenant or cabinet in some cases, with a multitude of variations in between. Some DCIMaaS features include:

Identification of “zombie” servers and equipment in standby mode.
Device-level power monitoring, allowing users to make smarter decisions on the server workload.
More power granularity, which allows for higher-density racks (up to 50 percent more in some cases).
Precision environmental monitoring that provides real-time identification of hotspots, enabling higher ambient temperatures to be managed.
Enhanced power monitoring for resolving billing disputes and providing power-based incentives in the SLAs (time of day, load balancing, etc.).
To incorporate DCIMaaS, tenants will need billing-grade intelligent PDUs. Outlet-level metering is a must for understanding power utilization, and some PDUs offer remote outlet control as well. A properly deployed DCIM can reduce total IT load 10 percent to 20 percent while allowing the MTDC provider an additional revenue stream for remote monitoring services.

As a Global Data Center Technology leader, Rahi specializes in supplying the latest power, cooling, and infrastructure solutions to deliver the best performance and immediate results for our customers. Contact one of our application experts to learn more about how our solutions can address your needs.

Produced by Daniel James from the MTDC team in collaboration with Bill Evanger from sales engineering at Rahi, your consultants in both gray and white space.