Offshore data centre relies on energy efficient cooling solution from Edenaire
Jersey, part of a unique offshore data hosting community has for a number of years been positioning itself as a strategic financial hub supporting some of the world’s key institutions. Foreshore one its largest and most technologically advanced offshore co-hosting data centres provides a critical resource for many large corporations and multinationals. Like all data centres, Foreshore has demanding cooling requirements and relies on Edenaire to provide precision cooling solutions that enable it to keep its IT systems operational 24/7.
Partly owned by Jersey Electricity Company, Foreshore, based in ‘The Powerhouse’ is Foreshore’s primary data centre and forms the core of a fully networked facility, independent of any single cable carrier, telecoms or Internet Service Provider.
The data centre first became operational in 2000 and has rapidly expanded to meet demands. Each phase of expansion has been built to international standards and designed to ensure that there are no single points of failure and all critical services are fully redundant. Environmental conditions are set at 21°C +/- 2°C and 50% RH +/-10%. Summer ambient is set at 35°C.
“Foreshore is predominantly an Internet Service Provider” says Chris Evans, Managing Director of Foreshore. “We provide a critical resource and deliver 100% Service Level Agreements for our customers. Each time we expand it is imperative that high levels of service are maintained, as any loss of connectivity would seriously impact our customers’ businesses. A resilient cooling strategy is a key part of our business model.”
With a need to expand its facilities Foreshore worked closely with Hereford-based Saradan, a specialist data centre consultancy. As facilities expand so does the amount of heat generated, requiring a robustly managed energy efficient cooling solution to keep the data centre fully operational.
To match the Phase 1 design cooling load of approximately 360kW Net a number of air-conditioning solutions were investigated – chilled water, glycol cooled and direct expansion.
Consideration needed to be given to future expansion and the need for future external space to facilitate additional heat rejection plant. Edenaire secured the tender to provide energy efficient cooling as part of a phased expansion programme but the project wasn’t without its challenges, as the site is subject to space and height restrictions and Jersey’s own listed building criteria.
“The external ground and roof space was limited leaving a DX solution the only option,” says Saradan’s Malcolm Harris. As Foreshore was keen to reduce its energy consumption and dependency (it is currently the fifth largest user of electricity on the island) Edenaire’s BTX range was specified by Saradan as the system offering the best energy efficiency, using fresh air as the cooling medium in the colder days and nights, effectively providing partial or full ‘free cooling’ for approximately 60-70% of the year.
In addition to free-cooling, noise and space constraints had to be addressed. Jersey is a small island, largely residential with tight restrictions on commercial buildings’ height and noise which requires a 20dba limit from the company’s car park boundary.
A total of 11x35kW DX D/F BTX units were supplied to match the load providing N+1 resilience, with two Edenaire 60kW IPAC DX units supplied to provide cooling for the UPS room. Four further 30kW D/F, DX eBTX units were supplied were supplied to meet the needs for Phase 2A. With the addition of further equipment and an increase in cooling loads and blade server technology in modern data centres, there is a need to cater for high density rack cooling.
Foreshore’s strategy was to expand further and take advantage of blade server technology (Phase 2B) to remain competitive and involved air conditioning design being set at 1.2kW/m² net sensible cooling load (an average of 4kW per rack), with the capacity to cool individual racks to higher loads with the use of containment technology in future if required. With limited external window space and insufficient roof space six 60kW (N+2) Edenaire IPAC 70-2, DX downflow units, each connected to two single circuit air-cooled condensers were used and installed at each end of the rack rows to provide better air distribution and resilience. Two Series 700 air handlers were also installed the UPS room.
“There is huge growth potential for Foreshore with the increase in demand for offshore gaming, disaster recovery and cloud computing,” comments Bob Huelin, Manager, JE Building Services Jersey Electricity Company.
“Foreshore’s data centre facilities will need to expand to compete and use the latest technology and methods that may include hot and cold aisle configurations, high density rack cooling but with more emphasis on energy savings.”