Your data center project's success depends on more than just ordering and installing hardware

Whether your data center project is large or small, new construction or renovation, its success is dependent on more than just ordering and installing hardware. It's really a coordinated project that requires teamwork between your design and engineering consultants, general, electrical, and HVAC contractors, and IT infrastructure specialist. A well-planned design should address environmental and building considerations that may be unique to the space it will occupy. Project execution that is based on a standardized manufacturer-approved process will deliver a product that is high on performance and efficiency and short on setbacks and surprises. We usually don't consider a building's ability to withstand flood, tornado, hurricane, or other weather-related risks when planning a secure data center in a New York City commercial high-rise. However, there may be some building interior factors that, if overlooked can cause project delays and the need for unexpected retrofits. Teaming an experienced IT infrastructure specialist with your design/build experts will minimize environmental and building-related risks, and lessen the chance of communication and execution errors. Floor Loading A typical data equipment rack can top out at 2,000 lbs. in weight capacity over a footprint of just 42" x 24". Grouped together, a bank of racks or enclosures that hold servers, switches, air handling systems, and batteries can distribute a load of several tons over a relatively small floor space. During the design phase, the building specifications and load capabilities of the data center location should be evaluated by a structural engineer. If not properly supported, the weight of the equipment could compromise the interior structure of the building, presenting a potentially hazardous condition. We've worked on several projects that required structural building modifications in order to handle this new source of floor loading. Planning ahead for these situations gave end users the satisfaction of projects that were completed on time without surprise costs. Building Power and Efficiency In a perfect world, your building will be equipped to provide the right amount of electricity needed to feed your data center's power and cooling needs. Due to the age and structural differences in the many high-rises of New York, there's really no consistent method of electric delivery from building to building. This makes it necessary for your IT infrastructure specialist to confer with your electrical contractor on existing building electric conditions. The data center power solution can then be designed based on the actual capabilities of the building, rather than the "perfect world" laboratory scenario. Data center energy efficiency relies heavily on the amount of power that is required to keep the equipment properly cooled. It's easy - and inefficient - to pump excess BTUs into a data center that generates too much heat due to a poor layout. We'll briefly discuss the impact of a good layout on energy efficiency below. A Layout for Proper Cooling With certain cooling systems, not only can a poor layout require excessive cooling, it can also decrease the available power to a given rack by over 50%! A manufacturer-certified IT infrastructure specialist can help to avoid inefficiencies by properly calculating the IT electrical load of the data center and designing a layout that can reduce electrical consumption by decreasing the load on the air conditioning system. The physical layout of the data center room includes information that is important to the equipment design, and requires collaboration between the design/build and IT teams. The location of support columns, walls, doors and power connections are all factored in when calculating the thermal dynamics and spacing of a "hot-aisle/cold-aisle" rack layout, which is vital to accomplishing cooling efficiency. Even design elements as seemingly nondescript as the location of ceiling and raised floor tiles, and how racks are positioned above or below them factor in when achieving electrical efficiency. Data center design has changed from "art" to science, and newer modular technologies allow for expansion without total rebuilds. These features give the end user abilities to capitalize on a hard ROI from their hardware purchases, as long as the design is well-conceived from the inception phase. A true collaborative effort between IT infrastructure professionals and the design/build teams will ensure lasting performance and efficiency in new data center projects. Michael Hoernecke is executive vice president of BBH Solutions, Inc. New York, N.Y.