|
Tuesday, March 11, 2008 Saving Energy in Data CentersA group at Microsoft Research attacks the problem on two fronts. By Erica Naone
Data centers are an increasingly significant source of energy consumption. A recent EPA report to Congress estimated that U.S. servers and data centers used about 61 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity in 2006, or 1.5 percent of the total electricity used in the country that year. (See also "Data Centers' Growing Power Demands.") Concern about the amount of energy eaten up by data centers has led to a slew of research in the area, including new work from Microsoft Research's Networked Embedded Computing group, which was showcased last week in Redmond, WA, at Microsoft's TechFest 2008. The work attacks the energy-consumption problem in two ways: new algorithms make it possible to free up servers and put them into sleep mode, and sensors identify which servers would be best to shut down based on the environmental conditions in different parts of the server room. By eliminating hot spots and minimizing the number of active servers, Microsoft researchers say that the system could produce as much as 30 percent in energy savings in data centers. The sensors, says Feng Zhao, principal researcher and manager of the group, are sensitive to both heat and humidity. They're Web-enabled and can be networked and made compatible with Web services. Zhao says that he envisions the sensors, which are still in prototype form, as "a new kind of scientific instrument" that could be used in a variety of projects. In a data center, the idiosyncrasies of a building and individual servers can have a big effect on how the cooling system functions, and therefore on energy consumption. Cooling, Zhao notes, accounts for about half the energy used in data centers. (He believes that the sensors, which he says could sell for $5 to $10 apiece, could be used in homes as well as in data centers, where they could work in tandem with a Web-based energy-savings application.) Another aspect of the research, explains Lin Xiao, a researcher with the group, is new algorithms designed to manage loads on the servers in a more energy-efficient way. Traditionally, load-balancing algorithms are used to keep traffic evenly distributed over a set of servers. The Microsoft system, in contrast, distributes the load to free up servers during off-peak times so that those servers can be put into sleep mode. The algorithms are currently designed for connection servers, which are employed with services for which users may log in for sessions of several hours, such as IM services or massively multiplayer online games. Because long sessions are common, shifting loads requires complex planning in order to avoid disconnecting users and other problems with quality of service. Xiao says that the group has developed two types of algorithms: load-forecasting algorithms, which predict a few hours ahead of time how many servers will need to be working, and load-skewing algorithms, which distribute traffic according to the predictions and power down relatively empty servers. |
Audio »
Share »
Digg this
Add to del.icio.us
Add to Reddit
Add to Facebook
Slashdot It!
Stumble It!
Add to Newsvine
Add to Connotea
Add to CiteUlike
Add to Furl
Googlize this
Add to Rojo
Add to MyWeb
Favorite
Print
E-mail
Gadgets to Spur Energy Conservation
11/14/2007
Comments
kitk on 03/11/2008 at 1:46 AM
52
heck, think of how well they could HEAT a building in winter!
nekote on 03/11/2008 at 6:01 AM
115
What gets done differently if humidity is higher or lower, at one spot versus another?
Lastly, what about ducting?
Concentrating heat removal at the heat source?
(Versus providing cooling to the entire room)
Too expensive to do on a rack by rack or even bank of racks basis?
Already assumed - standard practice?
Erica Naone on 03/11/2008 at 11:13 AM
Assistant Editor
25
That said, I've forwarded your questions to him, in case there is a particular use for knowing the humidity in a data center. Same story on the ducting. I'll let you know when I know more.
Best,
Erica Naone
Erica Naone on 03/11/2008 at 4:26 PM
Assistant Editor
25
"Ducting is an interesting example of re-thinking about the way data centers/racks are designed. In general, moving air (as in room-sized air-conditioning) across a long distance is expensive in energy use. Cooling for the entire room is also expensive. People have been thinking about new form factors/rack arrangement, for example, in the “container data center” form factor from manufacturers such as Rackable and Sun.
"Humidity is usually correlated with temperature (inversely). Humidity is important for the efficiency of the air-conditioning. If the humidity is too high in the return air, one needs to de-humidify the air before cooling."
IntegrationArchitect@hotmail.com on 03/13/2008 at 10:09 AM
1
If humidity is too high, excess water causes any number of problems like mold growth, restricting airflow, condensation and low voltage electrical short outs, and even high voltage electrical shocks.
Datacenter heat containment is simple with the right racks and hot/cold isle layout if you have a free weekend to take everything down to do it. The racks should have closed sides and front blanking panels to cover any openings if the rack is not full. The Computer room AC should (raised floor) should put lower temperature air in the front and pull the hot air out the back. Not having raised floor means starting over. Other point solutions like in rack cooling can work but you loose 25% of the floor space but avoid waiting for funds to build a new datacenter from scratch.
fiberman on 03/11/2008 at 11:26 PM
40
BROWND4D on 03/15/2008 at 1:21 AM
1
kishore on 05/23/2008 at 4:00 PM
1
http://www.gesensing.com/products/gear_trak.htm?bc=bc_indust+bc_pro_chm
Thanks,
Kishore Babu Gaddam.
Software Architect,
Bechtel Software Engineering & Construction (SEC)