\n\tLoccioni Humancare is an Italian company that provides technological solutions for the healthcare industry. This data center is in a hospital where it provides a repository for patient data, images and clinical data. Its design is optimized for energy efficiency and ease of maintenance.
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\n\tThis Wall Street Journal video features Loccioni’s “green” philosophy for sustainable living and design.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: Thomas Farina (See more photos from this data center on Farina’s Flickr page.)
\n\tCabinets are fitted with rear-door heat exchangers, which suck in the hot exhaust air of the servers and blast it out again as cold air. The technology – the IP is owned by IBM – can take away up to 60 percent of the heat in a full rack, the company claims.
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\n\tThe result of these changes is a datacentre PUE (power usage effectiveness) of 1.27, which generated a return on IBM’s investment within 10 months.
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\n\tSee Cool runnings: IBM’s recipe for a happy datacentre, in pictures by Jon Yeomans
\n\tRacks and cable view
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\n\tSee Cool runnings: IBM’s recipe for a happy datacentre, in pictures by Jon Yeomans
\n\tEquinix is a provider of global data center solutions.
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\n\tView of overhead cabling infrastructure inside the Equinix SE3 data center facility in Seattle, WA.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: Equinix
\n\tView of customer cages inside the Equinix SE3 data center facility in Seattle, WA.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: Equinix
\n\tExterior view of the Equinix SE3 data center facility in Seattle, WA.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: Equinix
\n\ttheEasyStreet, an IaaS provider, offsets all resources it consumes, resulting in zero carbon footprint operations in its Beaverton, OR data centers and offices. EasyStreet’s newest data center represents nearly four years’ research and design equity to build the most energy-efficient colocation facility in the region. Energy-saving technologies such as Indirect Evaporative Cooling and chimney cabinets reduce costs as well as carbon emissions while directing more power to customer cabinets.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: EasyStreet
\n\tAn innovative Indirect Evaporative Cooling (IEC) system from AMAX\u00ae is key to efficiency. Direct Expansion (DX) packages provide supplemental cooling when required. (Estimated need is only 180 hours per year.)
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\n\tPhoto Credit: EasyStreet
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\n\tPhoto Credit: EasyStreet
\n\tSubmerging your data center in fluid is definitely a next-generation method of temperature-control, but as ZDNet’s David Chernicoff reported in “Submerge your data center,” it is an intriguing option. Basically, specially designed server racks are submerged in a “dialectric” fluid, very similar to mineral oil. System fans aren’t needed, hard drives are encapsulated and airtight, and the thermal grease between the CPU/GPU and heat sink is replaced by Indium foil.
\n\tAnother innovation in data center design puts old infrastructure to new use. In this case, a Cold War bunker in Switzerland was refitted to hold Radix Technologies cloud data center. Dug into Alpine rock, this installation was built to withstand nuclear blasts and features steel doors and reinforced concrete walls. Pictured here is an access tunnel between technology corridors. This is part of Toby Wolpe’s gallery, “Inside the Cold War bunker that’s now a cloud datacentre,” where you can view more photos of this former military site.
\n\tThe NextFort High-density Computing Suite (NextFort HCSTM) is a completely self-contained, all concrete and steel room designed to house up to 20 high-density IT racks for a total IT load of up to 225KW.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: NextFort
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\n\tPhoto Credit: NextFort
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\n\tThe 45-acre Verne Global data centre complex is located near Reykjavik, Iceland, minutes from Keflav\u00edk International Airport. The facility is situated on the site of the former Naval Air Station Keflavik, a key strategic NATO base for over 50 years and chosen for its extremely low risk of natural disaster. Located well to the west of all of Iceland’s volcanic activity, arctic breezes and the Gulf Stream push volcanic effects away from the Verne Global site and toward Western Europe.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: Verne Global
\n\tVerne Global’s facility has been designed to fully utilise Iceland’s unique environmental power advantages: 100% powered by renewable energy resources and 100% cooled by the natural environment of Iceland, without the use of chillers or compressors.
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\n\tAll electricity comes from 100% renewable, geothermal and hydroelectric energy. Iceland is the only country in Western Europe that still has large indigenous amounts of competitively-priced hydroelectric and geothermal energy remaining to be harnessed.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: Verne Global
\n\tHigh security features include:
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\n\tPhoto Credit: Verne Global
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\n\tThe 8,020-square metre facility contains four 1440kW Digital Realty Turn-Key Flex pods, a modular product to provide flexibility for customers to scale their capacity.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: Digital Realty
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\n\tSee Digital Realty officially launches Western Sydney datacentre by Spandas Lui
\n\tEach data hall has staging workspace for technical operations, with lift access, power and cooling facilities throughout. The vast data halls are also kept cool with the help of 14 CRAC (computer room air conditioning) units that can be found operating in an N+2 configuration (providing back ups) in each of the 1,000 square foot pristine data halls.
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\n\tThe datacentre halls are raised 4m above ground level and have an 800mm raised floor. The floor can take loads of up to 12.5KN/m\u00b2.
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\n\tSee A photo tour of Digital Realty’s newest London datacentre by Sam Shead (ZDNet)
\n\tRackspace’s Slough-based datacentre houses the hardware for its UK cloud, along with the other servers rented by its customers. It has 1,600 racks in place, of which 120 support its cloud.
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\n\tRackspace’s server hardware is predominantly supplied by Dell. It operates a multi-vendor networking approach: Cisco is the predominant provider of switching technology, while Juniper Networks supplies backbone services and Brocade provides equipment for load balancing.
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\n\tPhoto credit: Jack Clark
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\n\tSee Inside Rackspace’s UK cloud datacentre for more photos.
\n\tThe datacentre has a power usage effectiveness (PUE) rating of 1.7, though Rackspace hopes to lower this to an average of 1.59 once the third data hall is built.
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\n\tCooling is achieved via computer room air-conditioning (Crac) units that pass cold air through the underfloor plenum. The current is then lifted into the servers and expelled as hot air at the back. Unlike numerous other datacentres, the racks are not enclosed.
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\n\tPhoto credit: Jack Clark
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\n\tSee Inside Rackspace’s UK cloud datacentre for more photos.
\n\tDatacentre security is vital: there are biometric readers and secure mantraps on both levels of the datacentre that control access to the datahalls and are programmed so that the first set of doors must close before the second set opens. Each door has a proximity card reader that is pre-programmed with a client’s access information.
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\n\tSee From warehouse to (data)warehouse: Virtus keeps it cool in North London by Sam Shead
\n\tThe Las Vegas Sands Corporation runs two casino resorts in the gambling mecca, the Venetian and the Palazzo.
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\n\tThe two establishments run off the same infrastructure, which uses 300 servers to support more than 11,000 suites and rooms, 3,000 slot machines and 200 gambling tables, and run nine websites. The bulk of the Venetian and Palazzo’s core systems run on six IBM’s iSeries servers (pictured), formerly known as AS/400s.
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\n\tPhoto Credit: David Meyer
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\n\tSee Datacentres of the world: A photo tour by ZDNet Staff
Selena Frye is a former Senior Editor for TechRepublic. Her background is in technical writing, editing, and research. I edit the Data Center, Linux and Open Source, Apple in the Enterprise, and IT Security blogs.
