Tooling Up to Go Green

By Jeff Feinman

June 16, 2008 —  (Page 1 of 8)
The name of the data center game these days is green, as in energy efficiency and reduced expenses.

Much of the IT industry is putting its focus on decreasing data center power consumption, mainly because of customer demand, and that it can result in a significant drop in operations cost. There are various ways in which this is being done.

Some organizations are seeking to institute standards for data center management. The Green Grid, for instance, has created two metrics, Power Usage Effectiveness and Data Center Efficiency, which help data center operators estimate the energy efficiency of their data centers. Also, Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design is a third-party certification program that provides data center ratings.

However, there is no clear data center standard, and there is difficulty in defining exactly what a green data center should entail due to different sizes and needs of facilities.

While data center standards may not be quite ready for prime time, many companies are already implementing power-saving, cost-efficient technologies, both as products on the market and for their own operations. Whether it’s phase-changing batteries, technologies that remotely power down servers or server consolidation efforts, many companies are trying their best to bring energy-reducing technologies to the table.

Everything Green
IBM has committed to a number of goals in reducing energy consumption with Project Big Green. About a year into the project, IBM has worked with more than 2,000 customers worldwide building data centers and creating energy-efficiency initiatives. The company is also partaking in a large server consolidation effort that it hopes to complete by the end of 2009.

Project Big Green attempts to conserve energy in every possible aspect of data center management, ranging from the facilities level to the administrator level. The project is aiming at implementing more intelligent design and more efficient cooling systems (for example, using liquid as opposed to air for cooling). It is trying to increase virtualization and put into practice what the company calls active energy management, which involves managing and monitoring data centers for optimal energy use.

Related Search Term(s): Cooling, data centers, green computing, HVAC, power, virtualization, Avocent, BlackMesh, Force10 Networks, IBM, Novell, Tideway

Share this link: http://www.sysmannews.com/link/32382