BRIEF
Our award winning OREO energy optimisation programme is an energy saving initiative to target several sites across an estate which are consuming excessive energy. The objective is to demonstrate and prove the benefits of OREO in terms of PUE and energy performance change. Project energy saving is maximised for minimum investment spend producing impressive Return on Investment (ROI) figures. The scoping and delivery programme focuses on feasibility studies, development of energy models, detailed design and high quality delivery processes in existing or new data centre environments. Energy efficiency and reduction is on the forefront of modern engineering and InfraNorth have a track record of delivering all scale projects, utilising an extensive range of energy improvement methods.
Existing site ‘Power Usage Effectiveness’ (PUE) is benchmarked at 1.92 and the predicted new PUE is estimated at 1.40.
Estimated annual energy savings are £80,663.
First month projected savings were estimated at £6,722 and the actual savings were £7,391.
Predicted ROI is 4.02 years
The project begins with a full facility survey from our highly experienced engineering team. This survey captures information on all existing assets, the building, room strategy, site infrastructure and also reviews the energy profile of how the site is currently performing.
The site is located near residential housing therefore noise mitigation was required to satisfy local authority requirements. The existing site is a multifunctional use building comprising of a two storey office building and network building formed by a mixture of brick and stone external walls.
As part of this specific project, the main objectives were to reduce the run hours of the various DX systems installed across the site and also improve air flow distribution in the legacy environments.
New direct fresh air systems, totalling 180kWc, were installed to reduce the run hours of several DX systems installed within the technical rooms. These fresh air systems were installed with economiser modules to allow the mixing of air in low ambient conditions and protect IT servers.
Several limitations were present within the rooms such as no service voids and various confined areas resulted in hot spots and wasted cooling energy. The design and installation of ductwork ensured an improvement of air flow distribution throughout.
High specification control panels were provided complete with full power monitoring. The controls software logic isolates ‘+1’ modules and prioritises the higher efficiency cooling systems as well as providing visibility and management of the environment via remote dashboards.
The fans inside existing DX-CRAC systems were replaced with new EC fan technology to lower module energy consumption. These have a smaller motor for the same duty requirement and with built in electronic control on EC fans there is now the possibility of demand led control with the minimum power requirement.
All rooms were optimised by rack blanking and floor blanking to improve air flow distribution. The rooms are also now equipped with new VESDA aspirating smoke detection with continuous air sampling providing earliest warning of an impending fire hazard inside and outside the building.
