NetApp's Energy Efficient (Low PUE) Data Centers @SLF
I recently attended an event hosted by Sustainable Silicon Valley’s Sustainability Leader’s Forum at NetApp. Peter Perrault, The Green Giant of NetApp was one of the speakers at the event and shared with us NetApp’s journey towards Energy efficient (Low PUE) Data Centers.
A data center is a large facility housing enterprise IT assets and includes building infrastructure required to operate various systems. Exponential data growth is a reality for most data centers in the Silicon Valley. IDC Worldwide Disk Storage systems Forecast 2006–2010 predicts that worldwide data will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 50.6% through the decade. In light of such rapid data growth, IT managers are under pressure to manage enterprise data more effectively due to budgetconstraints, and therefore are looking for new and innovative ways to do more with less.
The current accepted standard to measure data center efficiency is Power Usage
Effectiveness (PUE). PUE is a standard metric developed by The Green Grid an IT
industry group. It helps gauge data center efficiency and is a measure of the power that is needed to run a data center versus the power that is directly used by the IT equipment. In other words, PUE = (Total Data Center Power / Total IT Power) and is a snapshot of power not energy.
The current benchmark for a good data center is a PUE of 1.51 - 1.75. Lower the PUE, more
efficient the data center. The goal is to reach a PUE of 1. The PUE rate will not be an accurate measure of data center efficiency if IT is doing a poor job and Facilities is doing a fantastic job or if both are doing a poor job. In order to achieve this goal IT and Facilities have to collaborate. At NetApp, IT and Facilities have weekly meetings together to reach this goal.
When it comes to improving data center efficiency, Peter Perrault says you cannot manage what you do not measure. Apart from using PUE as a measurement, NetApp also uses compute utilization to measure throughput and bandwidth. In other words at NetApp they try to measure how much compute work they are getting for the amount of energy.
What is NetApp doing to lower their PUE? NetApp has brilliantly adapted to their environment and laws of physics by incorporating outside air to provide some or all of the cooling requirements of their data center. This technique has allowed NetApp to maximize cooling to improve data center efficiency.
NetApp also uses virtualization and consolidation of IT systems to manage their data more efficiently. They make sure not to overcool their systems by continuously improving heat containment. Some of the other techniques used by NetApp to attain data center efficiency are minimizing electrical conversion losses, and using waste heat. NetApp’s journey towards a PUE of 1 continues while they continuously monitor and fine tune processes.
NetApp's newest data center built in 2010 inNorth Carolina was the 1st ever to receive the EPA Energy Star fordata centers, scoring 99/100 points on their scale. That facility has an actual PUE of 1.13 and the design is avoiding 95,000 Mt CO2e/year – the equivalentof removing 16,000 cars from the road every year.
NetApp’s PG&E rebate in 2008 was nearly one million and a half US Dollars. “Being Eco-Friendly Pays" says NetApp's Peter Perrault with a big smile!
Comment
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Comment by Nash N on June 18, 2011 at 4:32pm -
Excellent article. Thanks for posting. It's always good to see new technologies leading to improved PUE ratings. In this article http://blogs.carouselindustries.com/green-it/what-is-pue-power-usag... there's a common sense explanation of what PUE is and how to calculate it. Given that improving equipment efficiency is a given, PUE is a very effective measure of overall performance. I wish NetApp all the best for their efforts.
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Comment by Peter Perrault on June 15, 2011 at 10:02am -
Thanks for the great coverage Manouri!
There are just a couple of items I'd like to take a little further. First, a PUE of 1 is the theoretical goal, however this is essentially impossible since every data center will need to have lights on and some other forms of mechanical/facilities infrastructure (CRAH units, alarm/monitoring system, etc). We seek to drive as close to 1 as possible, but there is a limit. And next is that while we measure and report PUE, as you noted we really are looking for a better way to measure overall efficiency and productivity in the data center.
NetApp and others are looking at Data Center energy Productivity (DCeP) as a better metric to evaluate data center performance since it captures the IT efficiency/productivity as well as the infrastructure efficiency. DCeP was also developed by The Green Grid, and seems to be better indicator of performance since it captures utilization of IT assets (storage, servers, and switches); the challenge then becomes (1) capturing the right data from the right points in the right intervals, and (2) defining "useful work."
Point (2) seems to be a huge struggle among IT practitioners at the moment, and one in which I personally don't engage in (bare in mind I'm no IT practitioner either!). But the essence of what we are driving at here is this: how many ones and zeros can we squeeze out of our IT systems for the same unit of energy (or carbon)? Once you've got the most efficient data center design and infrastructure, you've then got to ensure you are maximizing the potential of your IT assets.
If any readers would like to find out more about NetApp's world-class data centers or our data storage solutions, we're always happy to share our knowledge and best practices (PS - I am not in sales). I've got a number of white papers and case studies that may help further this discussion, as well as resources on both energy efficient data centers and sustainability at NetApp, feel free to drop me an email: peterp@netapp.com
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