Data Center Energy Savings
The simplest approach to data center energy savings might suggest that a facility manager’s best option is to turn off a few air conditioners. And there’s truth to this. See the graph below, showing before and after energy usage, and the impact of turning off some of the cooling units.
But the simplicity suggested here is deceptive.
Which air conditioners?
How many?
How will this truly affect the temperature?
What’s the risk to uptime or ridethrough?
While turning things off or down is likely our greatest opportunity for significant, immediate savings, the science driving the decision of which device to turn off and when, is complex and dynamic.
Fortunately, a convergence of new technology – wireless sensors for continuous, real-time and location-specific data, along with predictive, adaptive software algorithms that take into account all immediate and known variables at any given moment – can predict the future impact of energy management decisions, taking on/off decision-making to a new level. Now, for the first time, it’s possible – thanks to the latest AI technology – to automatically, constantly and dynamically manage cooling resources to reduce average temperatures across a facility and avoid hot and cold spots of localized temperature extremes. Simultaneously, overall cooling energy consumption is reduced by intelligently turning down, or off, the right CRACs at the right time. The result is continually optimized cooling with greater assurance that the overall integrity of the data center is preserved.
