Three recent data center outages illustrate the truth of the adage: “You can’t contract out responsibility.”
Alongside continued developments in liquid cooling, there are reports of air-cooled data centers that achieve standout levels of efficiency. Uptime explores the factors that combine to enable exceptional efficiency in air cooling.
Hyperscalers use DC busbars in their racks. Proven at large scale, the technology saves energy and materials, but without a market for DC servers that meets the needs of smaller operators and enterprises, no one else will use it.
While the fire risk with lithium-ion batteries is widely understood, guidance on how best to mitigate it is still evolving. Controlling a Li-ion fire is difficult because of chemistry that creates the risk of thermal runaway.
Goals for achieving net-zero emissions by 2030 are being extended, according to Uptime Institute survey data. This is likely driven by stricter reporting requirements, rising costs and limited availability of carbon-free energy.
It is becoming a near certainty that many facility operators will use direct liquid cooling within a few years. This raises a number of engineering questions, one of which is how to size coolant distribution units.
Sometime after 2026, the EU is expected to adopt an upcoming version of CENELEC’s TS 50600-5-1 Maturity Model to assess data center sustainability. The current technical specification has some controversial elements.
Adoption of direct liquid cooling (DLC) continues to grow slowly, according to recent Uptime research. However, more operators are considering it for future use due to mounting thermal management and sustainability challenges.
Electric grids face serious issues largely because of national efforts to reduce carbon emissions and boost electrification. Data center growth will add to these problems — but unreliable data could lead to poor decision-making.
The reporting of IT equipment Scope 1 to 3 emissions across the data center value chain can account for the same emissions up to six times. Sustainability efforts should favor achieving more efficient, less carbon-intensive operations.
Most cyberattacks are sudden and target financial gain. Attacks on data centers and critical infrastructure can be very different. State-sponsored hackers use varied and sophisticated tactics in support of geopolitical goals.
Cyberattacks on operational technology (OT) systems are rising, and OT failure could be catastrophic for data centers. Managers need to understand the nature of the threat and the defense options to protect their critical environments.
Uptime Intelligence is inviting interested parties to collaborate on an initiative to improve data sharing between co-hosting / colocation companies and IT operators in order to comply with regulations and meet sustainability goals.
Refrigeration’s history of progress is also a history of environmental concern. Whenever new refrigerants solve a problem, they create further crises down the line — and now history appears to be repeating itself.
The final EED delegated regulation was published on March 14, 2024. Data center operators have until September 15, 2024, to report the required information and key performance indicators to the EU database on data centres.
Andy Lawrence
Jabari Williams-George
Jacqueline Davis
Peter Judge
Rosa Lawrence
Daniel Bizo
Douglas Donnellan
Dr. Tomas Rahkonen
Jay Dietrich
Michael O'Neil