Summer Data Center Improvements — Increased Capacity and Increased Energy Efficiency
Thursday, 06 October 2011 15:43
Waveform News
More Data Center — Greener Data Center
The Michigan Data Center has been pretty busy this summer with physical upgrades. We’ve been working to increase our capacity (to meet the ever growing demand for data center space here in Detroit) improve reliability, and maximize our energy efficiency. Our strategy for a greener data center is a more energy efficient data center.
More Power
More demand means we need more power, and to provide that we’ve doubled the uninterruptible power supply (UPS) capacity and upgraded our generator to supply a full megawatt of backup power.
Waveform now operates four completely independent UPS units. This allows us to provide fully redundant power feeds to customers. All of our uninterruptible power supplies are Liebert, because we believe that they offer the best reliability and efficiency for the industry. A Liebert UPS operates at 94% energy efficiency, which is the most efficient operation of any battery UPS available right now.
Our new generator is a custom-built Kohler full megawatt generator. It’s has a twin turbocharged V-12 diesel engine that operates more efficiently than our old generator. The new generator meets the EPS’s tier 3 emissions standards, meaning it’s more environmentally friendly than the old generator as well.
Moreover, Waveform now uses only ultra-low sulfur fuel, which decreases the amount of sulfur dioxide released during generator runtime.
More Cooling
We’ve also added 180 tons of heat rejection capacity to the Michigan Data Center’s climate control plant. This increase not only adds capacity, but it increases our energy efficiency by an estimated 10%. The increased cooling load means we can more efficiently and reliably cool the data center on hot summer days, and we can take better advantage of free cooling provided by the old Michigan winters.