Energy Management Solutions
Data centres are increasingly coming under tremendous pressure and scrutiny to become more energy efficient as energy costs continue to rise in a time of rising energy demands, limited supply, coupled with fully stressed power and cooling infrastructures and increasing heat loads as the industry tries to meet increased demand levels for data processing, storage and computer resources, ultimately putting resilience and business continuity at risk.
For this reason, governments are campaigning and driving hard for data centres to become more ‘green’, which over a period of time has led to the emergence of new ‘green’ initiatives and technologies to help alleviate current issues. Furthermore, various carbon reduction initiatives and forthcoming legislation will ensure that monitoring, management and change in power utilisation will become mandatory.
As a result, the UK government has set up an Enhanced Capital Allowance (ECA) scheme to help businesses reduce carbon emissions by encouraging the purchase of approved energy saving equipment specified on the Energy Technology List (ETL). A number of Unites’ products and services, which qualify for Enhanced Capital Allowances, have been independently assessed and certified by The Carbon Trust on behalf of DEFRA. As a result, Unite has been awarded ‘approved supplier’ status on the ETL, providing a capability which benefits clients in the form of tax relief and reduced energy costs year on year, enabling businesses to claim back 100% of capital allowances on their Unite investment, in the first year.
As governments and corporations intensify their focus on reducing energy demands and carbon dioxide emissions, with the aim of minimising climate change, the efficiency of data centres will continue to increase. To facilitate this Unite has developed a corporate Energy Management Solution programme with the intention of helping our clients take advantage of any governmental financial incentives. An audit, carried out by Unite, will assess the current energy footprint and provide an accurate assessment of a client’s data centres including design details and typical operations. An inventory will be carried out on current systems, power usage and locations, taking into consideration any already established goals for reducing a company’s carbon footprint.
Collection and analysis of data on energy use, environmental conditions and ambient temperatures via our ‘non-invasive’ data collection systems will assist us in providing recommendations, savings calculations, risk assessments and deployment initiatives on power and cooling efficiency improvement programmes.
Unite Technologies will develop best practice energy management policies and strategies for clients’ data centres, identifying both current and future legislative requirements and the subsequent impact on a client’s organisation will be quantified on a case by case basis. Factors, such as room and rack layout, hot and cold aisle configuration and containment, recirculation of hot air back into clients’ IT equipment and prevention of hotspots that challenge cooling will all be taken into consideration.
