Data Center Managers Share Pain Points - ' Data Center Managers Share ' (
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"This is where the trouble can happen … Two different lines of reporting, two different budgets," Monroe said. This can be alleviated, he said, by "getting the money all in one place."
"The CIO is usually one of the target consumers of energy," Monroe said, "but the VP of facilities pays the bill. If an enterprise can align energy spending with budget responsibility, things will smooth out. Give the CIO an electric budget; give facilities the IT capital; and allow for savings to be accounted for where they happen."
The CIO will be motivated to stay within the budget, facilities will pay the bill and both can take credit when credit is due, Monroe said.
HCA Data Center Manager Jerry Ballard told eWEEK that his facility in Orlando, Fla., has about 350 to 400 servers divided into four rooms.
"Even though were getting a ton of new information [including various types of health records and X-ray imaging] each day, were running well within capacity," Ballard said. "We dont see any major problems right now with our system."
Ballard did say that he is in the process of replacing some older servers in one of the rooms. "Were doing a revolving kind of refresh," he said, "one room at a time, but theres no rush on it."
Debora A. Brugman, manager of operations support for Ameritas Life Insurance in Lincoln, Neb., told eWEEK that she was here to learn the exact steps to take in the event of a power failure or other disaster situation.
Ameritas has two data centers—one in Cincinnati, Ohio, as the result of a merger, and one in Lincoln—and Brugman, whos in training to possibly take over management reins in a couple of years, is trying to learn all she can as fast as she can.
"Weve got certain issues were trying to solve involving integration, and I think well have good ideas to share when we get back," Brugman said.
Read more here about how the EPA plans to improve server energy efficiency.
Another data center manager, who asked that he not be identified because hes not officially empowered to speak for his company, said he came to the conference looking specifically for cooling help.
"Were spending about eight times more on cooling than we should be," he said. "Weve got [alternative] natural gas engines and diesel engines, yet were spending $35,000 per month on power. We put in daylight dimming and other measures, and we can drop a quarter-megawatt demand in a minute and nobody in the building would notice anything.
"We are monetizing our alternative power assets pretty well," he said. "We will get credit from the utility for coming under our ceiling—we have prenegotiated rates. We come in under our peak 2-hour allowance each day. Going forward, the [refurbished] facility we are building will look totally different in a year or so. Electrical is now the largest cost within our group, and its teed up to be even larger, so weve had to make some big moves."
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