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The Naked Facts: Computing Consumes
In truth, the corporate data center is a behemoth power consumer and a substantial contributor to global warming. For every dollar spent on hardware in a data center, another 50 cents is spent on the energy to power the system, according to recent estimates from IBM. Data center servers, air conditioning, and networking equipment sucked up 1.2 percent of U.S. power in 2005—the output of five major power plants. Not only that, the monster is growing: energy expenditures and requirements have actually doubled in the past five years. Industrial use is approximately one third of energy consumed in the U.S. (Dept of Energy). At the present rate, infrastructure and energy costs will exceed total it costs by 2014.
Unfortunately, “green” has not yet become a top priority for company officers focused on sales figures, competitive positioning, product development and other concerns. One would imagine that even if environmental issues don’t get the attention of companies, the financial drain that the IT department inflicts on the corporate budget certainly will. But a custom of corporate bookkeeping often blinds one department to the excesses of another: At many companies, the power bill is reflected on one budget; but the cost of technology resides on another. “IT pros don’t pay much attention to power consumption when buying gear,” states scientist Jon Koomey of Stanford University and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. Without a comprehensive understanding of the problem, it’s no surprise that the data center juggernaut roars on.
The Server as Spoiler
How did we get ourselves into this crisis? The answer is actually a consequence of vigorous business growth, progress and success: As computing demands skyrocket, servers in data centers proliferate. And now, the equation is rapidly spinning out of control as environmental concerns and cost-eficiency are overwhelmed by server sprawl. Excessive energy consumption from servers running hot leads to high cooling costs, overuse of fossil fuels, pollution, depletion of natural resources and release of harmful CO2 as waste. For every kilowatt of energy consumed by a server, roughly another kilowatt must be expended to cool that machine. By 2008, the power costs of a server are forecast to exceed the cost of the server itself.
Small wonder that overall electricity used by servers doubled between 2000 and 2005 (from 12 billion kilowatt hours to 23 billion), much of it generated by ancillary electrical equipment, such as cooling fans and facility lighting, according to scientist Koomey. This adds up to a cumulative energy cost for servers and data centers in the U.S. of approximately $3.3 billion annually. This pain is borne not only by the earth and atmosphere, but by the shareholders of companies spending their potential dividends on power bills, cleanup and disposal of obsolete equipment. And companies are now working against the inexorable equation that performance per watt doubles roughly every two years, along with a corresponding shift in power density. That means power density can now outstrip the data center’s cooling capacity before the limitation of floor space is reached. Until science can develop and deploy a cheap power source that is safe and practical, the only option for business is to become as lean and green as possible to halt the runaway server train before it can wreak its full havoc on the environment and the bottom line.
The Need for a New Computing Model—Lean & Green
Our domestic and global economy is increasingly dataintensive, and the only anticipated change is more of the same. The volume of data that we store is growing exponentially; data-intensive businesses are becoming more numerous—legal discovery, entertainment, pharmaceuticals, energy and minerals exploration, and services providers, to name a few. But the problem is not confined to these companies. All corporate data is exploding.
With evidence of the damage caused by server sprawl now incontrovertible, enterprises are going to have to deal with the looming data center environmental crisis, and sooner rather than later. The central question is, how to downsize and transition the data center in a financially sound and beneficial way. Data centers are an integral part of an organization; they cannot be simply dismantled.
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