Facility managers are constantly balancing data center availability, efficiency and cost. It’s rare that a single offering addresses all three challenges, but Vertiv™ Thermal Management Services does.
Planned preventive maintenance by a factory-certified Customer Engineer (CE) helps equipment perform optimally and often last decades and counting, but that’s just the start. From cooling unit retrofit parts, to turnkey installed upgrade services, Vertiv Thermal Management Services can help you calculate ROI, configure the right solution, pursue energy rebates, manage installations, and continually optimize your data center cooling systems.
It all begins with the Vertiv representative touring the customer site to understand a customer’s needs, which will likely yield both recommendations for retrofits and upgrades and adoption of best practices to optimize availability, achieve cost savings and energy reductions.
Estimating Cost Savings and Energy Reduction with an ROI Tool
After our site evaluation, the first step is often our proprietary ROI (return on investment) tool. We gather facility parameters including utility rate, main fan horsepower, and the presence of a compressor; the tool can assist you with understanding your estimated payback on the investment for the upgrade.
For example, by adding state-of-the-art Vertiv™ Liebert® iCOM™-S Unit Controls and eliminating drive belts and lowering fan speeds with EC plug fan retrofits, the ROI tool may potentially estimate an energy reduction of 74% for a certain site depending upon varying site factors. And the cost for the project could be recouped based on energy savings and improved PUE in an estimated 2-3 years.
Optimizing Thermal Management Efficiency Through Liebert iCOM-S Controls
Adding Liebert iCOM-S Controls to data center cooling units is one of the most impactful retrofits. Liebert iCOM-S lets you manage and control your units to improve protection, automate cooling system routines and simplify maintenance. It can enable up to 40% higher efficiency, improved protection and greater productivity. And what was once a solution just for very large data centers, has recently been tailored for the benefit of smaller sites.
Bringing Big Savings to Smaller Data Centers
The Liebert iCOM-S Service Bundle groups together the equipment, installation and annual service to deploy iCOM-S into a data center for sites with 3-20 cooling units. It includes wireless sensors installed throughout the data center to prevent hot spots, which can compromise availability. It also facilitates units working together in teamwork mode to allow the system to pick up the slack if one unit should go down or, in everyday situations, help react to IT load changes.
The bundle allows the cost of the solution to be spread out over a 3-year or 5-year contract. This helps enable the site to realize the control system advantages, enable efficiency savings and ROI as an operating expense rather than a capital expense. It’s particularly useful in industries that depend on multiple edge sites, like banking and financial services, colocation, government, healthcare, retail and education.
Advice Beyond Vertiv Offerings
Gains to data center efficiency and performance optimization can be enhanced by simple measures, and CEs also regularly advise on best practices. For example:
- sealing the envelope of the room to retain cool air
- using blanking panels to keep hot air in the hot aisle
- optimally placing perforated tiles
- managing cables to create a clear path for exhaust air
- using the latest ASHRAE recommended set points
- removing cardboard (often present in the form of server boxes) from the white space, as it absorbs moisture and makes units work harder
Thermal Management Services has helped achieve measurable energy savings for Verizon Wireless, exceeded minimum ROI estimates by 40% for QTS, and reduced energy consumption and freed up stranded capacity for American Family Insurance.
To see how Thermal Management Services can help your facilities, request to be contacted by your local expert.
