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August 8, 2008
• Vol.30 Issue 32
Page(s) 1 in print issue
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The Push To Monitor Power
Economy, Environmental Responsibility Continue To Drive Demand To Scrutinize Power
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 Want a challenge? Try living a day in the IT world without encountering discussion of saving power and “going green.” Increasingly, the industry is becoming consumed with the notion of tackling excessive energy consumption, particularly as the economy continues to struggle. But while the hype behind this movement is strong, there’s plenty of substance to back it up, along with a real need to monitor power use.
“Overall data center energy consumption is projected to double in the next four years, in part because energy efficiency gains lag while data center waste grows,” says Peter Dougherty, president and CEO of OnPATH Technologies (www.onpathtech.com). “As the price of oil continues to rise, it’s only natural for data center managers and other executives to scrutinize their power consumption and look for ways to trim spiraling energy bills.”
Beyond the push to save money, there’s also a building sense of environmental responsibility. Gartner has found that information and communications technology accounts for 2% of global carbon dioxide emissions, placing the IT industry on par with the aviation industry. In particular, Gartner has found that data centers account for nearly a quarter of global information and communications technology CO2 emissions.
 Focus On Power
Common sense might rule that massive data centers have a more urgent need to monitor power use, but experts contend that the practice is necessary even for small and midsized enterprises. In fact, power monitoring could prove even more valuable for SMEs.
“The cost of energy can impact the small and midsize corporations even more than the large enterprises,” says Gisa Abiog, director of sales and marketing for Cyber Switching (408/436-9830; www.cyberswitching.com). “Many utilities are offering rebates, but SMEs may not qualify because of the requirement that needs to be met to receive those rebates, and the smaller companies may simply not have the bandwidth to capitalize on such rebates.”
In a recent study that surveyed more than 1,100 IT executives at SMEs, IBM found that most SMEs say energy is their largest cost increase over the past two years, while more than one in three businesses say they believe IT accounts for 10 to 50% of their total energy costs. Further, more than 65% of businesses in most industries say energy efficiency is a key criterion when considering new IT investments.
“All data centers, for large or small enterprises, need to take proactive steps in reducing the energy consumption in their data centers. Efforts to reduce energy usage will depend on power monitoring in order to set a benchmark. Energy efficiency is an environmental and economic imperative that can no longer be ignored,” says Vinnie Jain, advanced marketing manager for Ortronics (www.ortronics.com).
Also driving the push in the IT industry to monitor power is the increasingly popular practice by companies to bill power usage back to the business units or departments that are consuming it, Abiog says. “This system of ‘billing’ brings the power problem to the attention of the user. The ‘owner’ of the equipment is much more likely to look for efficiencies, as well, since the cost of ownership comes out of his or her budget,” she notes.
Although there are reasons for addressing power use, not all companies are willing to put forth a concerted effort. Rackspace’s (www.rackspace.com) second annual survey in its Greenspace Initiative found that only 28% of surveyed companies were willing to sacrifice 10% of server performance for lower carbon emissions—far less than the 51% who said they would sacrifice the same last year. 63% of respondents said they wouldn’t sacrifice any performance for green efforts, up 22% from last year. However, 69% of surveyed companies said they are concerned about power efficiency and its impact on the environment and are seeking ways to address (or are already addressing) power efficiency within their companies.
Power In Monitoring
At its core, power monitoring can help organizations establish a set of metrics that can help identify potential deficiencies and other problematic areas. According to Ryan Murphey, director of data center operations at PEER 1 (www.peer1.com), it’s essential to gain visibility into areas where power is being used so data center managers can make appropriate modifications and/or upgrades to existing infrastructure. In turn, these measures can increase efficiency and recover some wasted power.
“[Power monitoring] allows you to establish a history of usage to better forecast future demand and availability to your organization,” Murphey says. “Only when you have collected the data will you be able to make informed decisions to where to deploy capital expenditures with valuable future benefits in order to save on ongoing operational expenditures.”
Because power impacts nearly every data center element, determining where to focus efforts can be a challenge, but some basics do apply. Ortronics’ Jain says that SMEs should measure incoming power to the data center in comparison to the overall facility power to measure DCIE (data center infrastructure efficiency), a metric members of The Green Grid (www.thegreengrid.org) developed. Jain adds that SMEs should also measure power at the rack and row levels to rebalance the load, if necessary, and that the rack measurements will help to manage data center hot spots.
“[The Green Grid is] working to establish common metrics for determining whether or not your facility is green,” Murphey says. “Without some kind of baseline power metrics, you have no way of knowing where and how you can best monitor and save power [and pass] on efficiencies to customers.” 
by Christian Perry
Look Before Leaping
Although the pressure to reduce power consumption in data centers is reaching a fevered pitch, careful data center managers will want to fully evaluate their power environment before making full-fledged efforts to address potential problems. Peter Dougherty, president and CEO of OnPATH Technologies (www.onpathtech.com), suggests that managers ask themselves the following questions to help make power-related decisions:
• What is the power consumption of our data center facility’s major components?
• Are we investigating whether energy usage inefficiencies exist in our data center, and are we looking for help to identify and eliminate them to save costs?
• Do we have difficulty bringing new applications and service online because of insufficient data center power or cooling capabilities?
• Is our facility currently able to support continuous operations for higher-speed networks and higher-density computing?
• Are we facing compliance issues on energy-related regulations? |
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