White paper provides roadmap to a fully deployed data centre using Predictive Modelling

The CBRE white paper describes a road map for data centre facilities management, which allows the Owner/Operator to utilise the available Capacity while maintaining Energy Efficiency and Availability.

The paper outlines the use of Future Facilities’ 6SigmaDC suite of software in creating the Virtual Facility combining the use of advanced CFD modelling with full Power Network monitoring to predict the engineering consequences of Load Capacity Planning changes in a data centre. These predictions highlight Capacity losses, Resilience issues as well as the knock on effects on Energy Efficiency within the data centre thus allowing the Owner/Operator to make the appropriate decision before actual IT equipment deployment.

This unique predictive methodology has been implemented and in use within a customer facility with outstanding results in maximising the utilisation of available capacity, enhanced resilience and major reduction in energy and operating costs.

Hassan Moezzi, CEO of Future Facilities said, “We warmly welcome this white paper. It’s fantastic to have customers and users of our software demonstrably show the benefits, efficiencies and cost savings they’ve been able to realise by using our 6SigmaDC software suite within their own or their customers’ facilities. We have full confidence in our products and it’s particularly pleasing when they are used by customers to solve difficult and challenging operational issues.”

The white paper covers three stages in a phased approach that begins with a work stream to improve facility resilience and efficiency. The initial phase focuses on highlighting performance issues with facility resilience, efficiency and stranded capacity. Phase two is concerned with implementing changes in the facility to improve the overall performance in all three areas. The third and final stage is to maintain the high capacity utilisation in operational management by predicting engineering cause and effect before any IT equipment deployment.

The level of detail provided by the Virtual Facility is a fundamental factor in allowing the engineers to clearly see how the facility is performing. The Virtual Facility provides a safe environment to model and test different changes prior to making physical changes to the actual data centre.
Mr Moezzi added “It is only via tracking the Power network and CFD modelling that engineers can fully understand the complex nature of airflow within the facility. This is a key variable to enable maximum data centre resilience and efficiency. Many companies are losing up to 30% of their realisable data centre capacity and also struggling with high operating costs, hot spots and challenges in deploying new projects in their data centres. With the right tools and processes these issues can be virtually eliminated”.

In this case study, the energy savings for the customer created by the project alone repaid the investment several times over within 18 months. In addition the customer managed to recapture up to 140 cabinets worth of capacity thus – delaying future capital spending in new facilities.