Reducing data center costs and environmental impact

Data center energy efficiency is coming under ever increasing scrutiny, with various local, regional and international standards and regulations (both existing and arriving) requiring data center owners and operators to demonstrate best practice when it comes to the environmental credentials of their facilities. Add in the industry’s drive towards net zero targets and the recent, substantial increases in global energy costs, and there’s never been a better time to focus on the importance of well-designed and maintained data center infrastructure. Airflow management and Optimization is a key aspect of any such data center energy efficiency improvement project.

In this white paper we present the six effective measures every data center owner or decision maker must consider when deploying IT cabinets. Some of these are straightforward but not always correctly understood and applied and some are highly innovative. In the end, all these measures prevent the mixture of hot and cold airflows at cabinet level, mitigating well-known issues like by-pass and recirculation airflows.

These measures are key to optimizing data center energy efficiency.

1. Cabinet airflow package

2. Blanking plates

3. Sealing cable entry points in the cabinet roof layout

4. Air seal plinths for raised cabinets

5. Sealing cable entry points as part of the cabinet airflow package

6. Sealing-kit between cabinets

By quantifying the performance of cabinets, concerning their level of providing an airtight seal between the hot and cold sides of the IT equipment, we demonstrate how important it is to take these measures into account for data center and computer room new builds or upgrades.

With the support of a testing company specialized in airflow measurements, we have calculated that investing in cabinet airflow packages in a data center with 4x inrow coolers and 18 cabinets producing 5kW of heat load each can easily save EUR 2.000,- on annual bases on energy savings alone. ROI of the investment is as quick as 18,5 months. The economic lifetime of an IT cabinet can easily reach 20 years. It means your IT cabinet will continue to save money well over 18 years after its initial deployment.