Green IT accelerates in Orlando Florida

Tonight is the opening keynote for the Uptime Institute and the crowd is filling the chairs this Sunday evening at Disney’s Swan Hotel. Many faces here are familiar to me from the Charrette last autumn in Santa Fe. But there is a larger contingent of international attendees and there seem to be multiple people from the same organization this evening. It is as if many participants from autumn were able to evangelize Green IT in the interim, and bring along some key decision makers to this event. The 2006 Symposium focus was on high density computing and the 2007 tagline was “the meltdown of Moores Law”. This Symposium is called: 2008 Symposium: Green Enterprise  Computing.                                                                     

 Mike Manos, General Manager, Data Center Services at Microsoft Corporation gave the evening’s keynote.  He works in “the Services Foundation” for the company, supporting 500 Million unique users visiting Microsoft sites each month, with over 150 sites and services to support. And data center operating costs are greater than capital costs. As an industry segment, data centers are the fastest growing energy segment in the US. “To be really good at services, you have to be really good at operations. Infrastructure becomes the strategic advantage for any company”, he said.

 
Microsoft data centers gain a net 20,000 new systems every month. Over the next five years, servers and power will grow 15x, network bandwidth will increase 9x, and data centers (with facilities that are hundreds of megawatts per facility), will (only, just) triple. This is no incremental growth because a product launch by Microsoft could result 30 million subscribers within the first six months – a real provisioning challenge for infrastructure and facilities managers.

New data center costs (in hundreds of millions of dollars) can be computed like this: 2% land, core and shell costs are 9%, architectural matters comprise 7%, and mechanical/electrical infrastructure runs 82%. Construction costs rise 10% every year, in his experience: it has been a constant average for Manos.  

 When describing new data centers, 500,000 sq feet buildings are not uncommon for those built today by Microsoft. They aren’t thinking about cheap and available power in a vacuum, of course. Site selection today includes the local internet population, how close the internet network is, mobile users, construction costs and tax climate, IT labor availability (for building and operating data centers), and your corporate citizenship strategy.

 
For online services, Manos wants disposable data centers – to be able to ramp up overnight for new products.  Microsoft does have a containerized version of bringing in a truckload filled with 1000 – 2000 servers and sliding the container in at 45 degrees – so 200 containers on the first floor with up to 2000 servers can be plugged, cooled, and live in a few hours.

50% of all outages worldwide are caused by human error. Microsoft has mostly Tier 2 data centers, (not designed for critical missions the way a Tier 4 data center is, for example). They have had 100% uptime over the last several years because of strong maintenance programs. Qualified crews, procedure based operations, inhouse electrical and mechanical engineers reviewing all designs or repair and replacements are all part of that program. He cited an example, an old building, with no additional technology, went from a PUE of 2.2 to 1.8 over a 15 month period just using the above good maintenance programs.

 
“I don’t care whether you measure PUE or DCIE,” Manos said. “Just measure something!” Roughly half the audience raised their hands when asked whether they are measuring power usage, up from 10% at a recent ASHRAE conference audience. Microsoft prefers PUE measurements because it is easier to understand in the context of overhead. The Microsoft annual average PUE target is to get to 1.1 annual average by 2012, every 24 months halving the distance to 1. There is a seasonality to data centers based on heat outside, load balance, etc. so you can’t take your “best” readings which probably occur at night in winter.

 With regard to IT carbon emissions: who has the numbers for your company? Manos says start collecting it because regulation on IT load is coming over the next 3-5 years. It is going to come through SOX-style commandments.

 He concluded his talk with a list of hazards which included innovation hoarding. So look forward to more specifics and transparency from Mike Manos and Microsoft. Have a green day!