Sustainable IT | Ted Samson | TAG: Server virtualization

MORE ENTRIES

TAG: Server virtualization

July 10, 2008 | Comments: (0)

Savor the fruit of others' green IT success

Organizations are contributing to the greater good by making their datacenter best practices transparent

Whether for the sake of helping tackle the datacenter power crisis, chipping in to fight global warming, winning over new customers, or racking up bragging rights, recently companies have been readily opening their datacenters in recent months (at least figuratively) and giving the world -- including would-be competitors -- a peek at their special techniques for reaping greater energy efficiency.

Whatever the motivation, the practice is bound to be of use to organizations confounded by high energy bills, limited power for their datacenters, and perhaps directives from above to cut carbon emissions by a hefty chunk (without sacrificing service levels, most likely). The trend will certainly prove invaluable to the Feds as they work to hammer out energy efficiency standards for datacenters.

These collective open-door datacenter policies are already bearing some juicy fruit. Accenture recently compiled results from 17 datacenter case studies supplied by members of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group (SVLG), part of the organization's Data Center Demonstration Project 2008.

In the report, titled "Data Center Energy Forecast Report," Accenture determined that there's hope for the IT industry as it struggles with energy shortages and environmental woes: Based on the successes of the various projects, Accenture supports the EPA's prediction from last year that datacenters can reduce electricity use by as much as 55 percent by 2011, with efficiency gains that could be realized using today’s technologies.

[For a list of the technologies and techniques recommended by the EPA, check out "50 ways to green your datacenter."]

This week, I'd like to share some of the interesting and effective practices as reported by the participating companies. Maybe you'll find inspiration among them to cut energy waste at your own organization -- and perhaps share your success story.

[For other sustainable IT success stories, check out the results from the InfoWorld Green 15.]

Hot air over here, cool air over there
Among the best practices for a datacenter is establishing hot and cold aisles. But some approaches trump others, as demonstrated by the LBNL in a small section of the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center in Oakland.

Typically, cold air blows up through the perforated tiles of a raised floor into the cold aisle and is sucked in to the server intakes to cool the machines. That air is then discharged into the hot aisle and, through return airflow, returns to the cooling unit.

For the test, the LBNL tried a couple of different configurations. The embedded image to the left depicts the two. As described by the report (and pictured here), in Alternate 1 configuration, "the cold aisle was sealed at the top and ends of the racks to prevent hot air re-circulating back into the cold aisle. In the Alternate 2 configuration, plastic partitions sealed the hot aisles off from the cold aisle, and the interstitial ceiling space was used as a return air plenum."

Turns out Alternate 1 was better at separating hot and cold air, resulting in several benefits. Among them, "by minimizing air mixing, and allowing the temperature difference between the supply and return air to increase, LBNL was able to reduce fan power by 75 percent without adversely affecting the server environmental conditions." That translates to a 12 percent reduction in cooling energy on an annual basis.

Additionally, the study suggests that by minimizing the mixing of hot and cold air, "the supply air and chilled water temperatures can be raised to 50 degrees Fahrenheit, which can save 4 percent in chiller energy. Raising that temperature to 50 degrees "and utilizing integrated water-side economizing [aka "free cooling"] can save 21 percent in chiller energy and result in increased chiller capacity," according to the study. Overall, that can mean an overall 18 percent reduction in cooling energy.

[Find out how Microsoft plans to take advantage of "free cooling" to lower its datacenter costs.]

The ideal consolidation destination
Symantec has a rather interesting case study to share: The company consolidated two corporate datacenters, one in California and the other in Arizona, into a purpose-built facility in Arizona. The project entailed reducing server count from 1,635 to 386. Yes, virtualization was involved but only on 81 machines. An astonishing 1,062 servers ended up decommissioned.

The company, of course, has reaped savings by reducing annual datacenter energy consumption from a cumulative 1,965,965 kWh to 1,665,300 kWh -- a savings of 300,665 kWh. That amounts to monthly energy savings of $45,051 -- and part of that is thanks to the fact that Arizona has lower energy rates than does California: 7.87 cents per kWh vs. 11.47 cents.

Let's pause for a moment to examine what a difference those energy rates make: All things otherwise being equal, had Symantec consolidated in California, it would be paying $191,009 per year for energy. In Arizona, it's paying around $131,059 per year. Also, Symantec was able to shed three consultants from its datacenter staff and shave an hour off the time it takes to set up server requirements for new projects.

Symantec says the project took four months to complete and cost $200,350, including freight moves, offsite tape storage, and shipping. If those numbers are accurate, that means a pretty quick ROI.

Seek energy-efficient PDUs
Depending on whom you ask, power conversion and distribution accounts for 20 percent of the wasted power in datacenters - similar to the way energy gets wasted when the PSU (power supply unit) in a PC transforms incoming AC electricity into usable DC electricity. That level of waste generated by inefficient PDUs (power distribution units) can be significant, a lesson learned by the United States Postal Service.

The USPS found that the three PDUs at its San Mateo, Calif. datacenter -- two purchased in the past two years and one from the mid-1980s -- had an average operating efficiency of 94.6 percent. The organization determined that moving to more energy-efficient CSL (Candidate Standard Level)-3 PDUs -- specifically Powersmiths Energy Stations and E-Saver-C3 transformers -- would result in operating efficiency of 98.4 percent.

Four percent may not seem like a huge difference, but USPS projects it will reduce peak demand by 45.6 kW and cooling demand by 13.2 tons per year at its 33,000 square foot datacenter in San Mateo. Annual power consumption will drop by 787,400 kWh, resulting in annual operating savings of $107,736 - or nearly $4,000,000 over 20 years (assuming 3 percent annual energy cost increases above inflation).

The transition also will reduce carbon emissions by 480 tons, as well as put a dent in sulphur dioxide and nitrous oxide emissions.

Yahoo reportedly has enjoyed the benefits of moving to more efficient PDUs as well: By replacing 30 PDUs with CSL-3-compliant models, the company expects to save $130,000 per year, lower peak demand by 69 kW, and reduce annual power consumption by more than one million kWh.

There are plenty of other useful nuggets of sustainable IT information to be gleaned from the Accenture report and various case studies. You can read them all on this Accenture microsite. In meantime, here's hoping more companies will step forward with success stories -- or valuable lessons learned from unsuccessful endeavors.

Ted Samson is a senior analyst for the InfoWorld Test Center and author of the InfoWorld Sustainable IT blog. Subscribe to his free weekly Green Tech newsletter here.

Posted by Ted Samson on July 10, 2008 03:00 AM

November 29, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Emerson delivers free Energy Logic blueprint for building a power-efficient datacenter

the path to green efficiency How-to guides are downright handy for tackling daunting projects, such as deploying a new BPM (business process management) solution or building a birdhouse (one of those really fancy ones with indoor plumbing).

One of the most daunting tasks that companies face today is figuring out how to wring greater energy efficiency out of their datacenters. Certainly, many vendors are ready to step up and demonstrate where their respective products fit into the power-saving puzzle. But there's something to be said for a vendor-neutral blueprint to plan the overall task.

That all is a wordy lead-in to pointing you to a new report -- available as a free download -- released today by Emerson Network Power. It's titled "Energy Logic: Reducing Data Center Energy Consumption by Creating Savings that Cascade Across Systems," and it's an impressive piece of work, outlining ten interrelated technology strategies that comprise a holistic approach to improving datacenter energy efficiency by as much as 50 percent, according to the company. And as I noted, it's free.

For a little background, Emerson has coined the term "Energy Logic" in this report, a strategy which, according to the company, "centers on 'the cascade effect' by which one watt saved at the processor level can save an average total of 2.84 watts in energy consumption."

The report starts at the server component level, outlining the benefits of low-power processors. "Independent research studies show these lower-power processors deliver the same performance as higher power models," the report says. "In the 5,000-square-foot datacenter modeled for this paper, low-power processors create a 10 percent reduction in overall datacenter power consumption."

Next up: power supplies. The report notes that most power supplies found in servers are working at around 72 percent effiency -- yet "best-in-class power supplies are available today that deliver efficiency of 90 percent. Use of these power supplies reduces power draw within the data center by 124 kW or 11 percent of the 1127 kW total," the report says.

From there, the report suggests that datacenter operators look at power-management software. Despite the fact that processors have built-in power-management features, they end up disabled for fear of crippling response time. Yet "in idle mode, most servers consume between 70 and 85 percent of full operational power."

The Emerson Energy Logic report suggests that admins reconsider how they use power-management features. In the 5,000 square foot datacenter model, the report says that using power-management features can reduce peak power draw from 80 percent to 45 percent, saving "an additional 86 kW or eight percent of the unoptimized datacenter load."

Blade servers have a role to play in the energy-efficient datacenter, according to the Emerson report. "Blade servers consume about 10 percent less power than equivalent rack-mount servers because multiple servers share common power supplies, cooling fans and other components. ... More importantly, blades facilitate the move to a high-density data center architecture, which can significantly reduce energy consumption."

Moving on, Emerson's Energy Logic strategy highlights server virtualization. In the 5,000 square foot model, "assuming 25 percent of servers are virtualized with eight non-virtualized physical servers being replaced by one virtualized physical server, ... virtualization provides an incremental eight percent reduction in total datacenter power," according to the report.

No. 6 on Emerson's energy-efficiency menu for datacenters: best cooling practices. That includes "sealing gaps in floors, using blanking panels in open spaces in racks, and avoiding mixing of hot and cold air." This is low-hanging fruit that requires no additional technology investment but can result in a five percent efficiency boost, based, again, on the 5,000 square foot datacenter model.

415V AC power distribution is the next strategy component in Emerson's Energy Logic scheme. The short of it is, most UPS systems are rather inefficient, as they convert incoming power to DC and then back to AC within the UPS. "In most datacenters, the UPS provides power at 480V, which is then stepped down via a transformer, with accompanying losses, to 208V in the power distribution system," according to the report. "These stepdown losses can be eliminated by converting UPS output power to 415V." The result: "an incremental two percent reduction in facility energy use" in the 5,000 square foot model.

Cooling reappears in the report next, specifically variable capacity cooling. "Typically, CRAC [computer room air conditioners] fans run at a constant speed and deliver a constant volume of air flow. Converting these fans to variable frequency drive fans allows fan speed and power draw to be reduced as load decreases," the report says. Emerson specifically cites digital scroll compressors here, which "allow the capacity of room air conditioners to be matched exactly to room conditions without turning compressors on and off."

The payoff: "A 20 percent reduction in fan speed provides almost 50 percent savings in fan-power consumption."

Ninth in the Emerson Energy Logic lineup is, lo, another cooling strategy: high-density supplemental cooling. Datacenter operators are cramming more machines into their facility, and CRAC systems alone can't handle the extra heat. "Supplemental cooling units are mounted above or alongside equipment racks, and pull hot air directly from the hot aisle and deliver cold air to the cold aisle," the report explains. These units can reduce cooling costs by 30 percent, Emerson reports.

Last but not least, there's monitoring and optimization. With varying types of hardware spread out around the datacenter, cooling can prove inefficient. "Cooling control systems can monitor conditions across the datacenter and coordinate the activities of multiple units to prevent conflicts and increase teamwork," the report says. "In the model, an incremental saving of one percent is achieved as a result of system-level monitoring and control."

There's plenty more information to be gleaned from Emerson's 21-page Energy Logic report, along with helpful charts and diagrams to help datacenter operators as they venture toward a greener, more sustainable facility.

Did I mention the report is available as a free download? Get it right here.

Ted Samson is a senior analyst at InfoWorld and author of the Sustainable IT blog, tracking trends toward greener, more energy-efficient IT. Subscribe to his free Green Tech newsletter here.

Posted by Ted Samson on November 29, 2007 10:02 AM

October 08, 2007 | Comments: (0)

VMware Infrastructure 3.5 will power down unused servers

Virtualization, in and of itself, is quite the green technology: It lets companies use fewer servers to get the same amount of work done. But the forthcoming Version 3.5 of VMware Infrastructure, which will include the new VMware ESX Server 3.5 and VirtualCenter 2.5, will include a feature designed to further reduce power consumption.

As descibed by VMware, "VMware Distributed Power Management is an experimental feature that reduces power consumption in the data center through intelligent workload balancing. Working in conjunction with VMware DRS, Distributed Power Management is designed to automatically power off servers not currently needed in order to meet service levels, and automatically power on servers as demand for compute resources increases."

That's a pretty cool trick indeed, though the "experimental" descriptor gives me a little pause. Hopefully on of the Test Center analysts will get a chance to kick those tires.

But it's certainly a step in the right direction toward a dynamic server farm.

VMWare Infrastructure 3.5 is due out later this year.

Posted by Ted Samson on October 8, 2007 03:24 PM

August 22, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Sun celebrates green datacenter innovations and tools

As part of its Eco Innovation Initiative, Sun shined a green-hued spotlight on its massive datacenter consolidation efforts yesterday and unveiled a host of tools and services to help datacenter operators inject some energy-efficiency and eco-friendliness into their own facilities.

At a high level, Sun's boasting significant benefits from the massive undertaking, most of which affected its datacenters in Santa Clara, Calif., but also its Blackwater, UK, and Bangalore, India sites.

In Phase One of the project at its Santa Clara site, Sun consolidated 2,177 servers down to 1,240. For example, they replaced 88 Sun Fire V880 systems with 58 Sun Fire T2000 and T1000 systems yielding a 91 percent reduction in datacenter floor space and a 60 percent reduction in power costs.

The company also consolidated 738 storage devices down to 225; and 550 racks down to 65 (reaping 88 percent compression of square footage). Power-wise, the company is shrinking consumption from 2.2MW to 500KW, which will result in an estimated $1.1 million cost savings per year.

In Phase Two, which entailed a new datacenter design, build-out and deployment, the company went from 254,000 square feet of facility space to 127,000, and it expects to reap another 30 percent in energy savings.

Sweetening the effort: Sun's enjoying nearly $1 million in rebates and awards from Silicon Valley Power, including a one-time $250,000 cooling innovation award, the first award of its kind given by the utility.

Sun estimates that the company's datacenter efforts will reduce its CO2 production by 4,100 tons per year, trimming 1 percent from the company's total carbon footprint. (The latter stat is pretty interesting; most companies don't get quite so detailed as to the size of their footprint.)

One of the most intriguing aspects of Sun's new datacenter design is its pods: modular, scalable clusters of racks or benches that have the same requirements. The design will enable Sun to easily and quickly swap in and out racks, as well as deploy modular power, cooling, cabling, and monitoring equipment. Planning for future growth, Sun designed server racks to support a capacity of up to 30kw per rack.

There's a lot more detail about the modular design and other technologies and practices Sun employed on the company's Web site. I recommend that you watch Sun's Energy Efficient Datacenter Tour on the company Web site. It's pretty interesting and informative, and not too market-y, either.

In addition to showing off its shiny new datacenter facilities, Sun unveiled several products and services to help companies wring more energy efficiency out of their own datacenters.

Among them, Sun unveiled three Eco Ready Kits: The Sun Eco Assessment Kit, The Sun Eco Optimization Kit and the The Sun Eco Virtualization Kit.

The Sun Eco Assessment Kit "provides a methodical approach to analyzing datacenter energy efficiency, using a combination of assessment services for systems, storage, and datacenter infrastructure."

The Sun Eco Optimization Kit is designed "to help customers optimize, consolidate, refresh, and recycle their hardware infrastructure ... ."

The Sun Eco Virtualization Kit "offers virtualization solutions that enable better asset utilization and datacenter energy efficiency," according to Sun.

Additionally, Sun announced its Eco Services Suite, which encompasses four offerings:

The Sun Eco Assessment Service for Datacenter, Basic, which is intended to help customers maximize power and cooling efficiency in the IT infrastructure running Web-based services;
The Sun Eco Assessment Service for Datacenter, Advanced, "a comprehensive datacenter service providing a technical evaluation of datacenter energy use, cooling capacity, rack placement, air distribution and other environmental factors";
The Sun Eco Cooling Efficiency Service for Datacenter, aimed at helping companies "recover misused air conditioning capacity and direct it to the areas where it is needed";
and the Sun Eco Optimization Service for Datacenter, through which Sun provides direct assistance with implementation of corrective actions outlined in the Eco Assessment Service.

Posted by Ted Samson on August 22, 2007 12:38 PM

August 02, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Is IBM's Big Iron also Big Green?

As part of Project Big Green, Big Blue is pushing its System z mainframes as an energy-efficient alternative to server racks

IBM, project big green, mainframes, big iron As the list of arguably green technologies continues to expand, it's interesting to observe how many of the candidates are by no means new. Virtualization has technically been around for years, for example, as have thin clients. But one of the more surprising technologies to make the list is the mainframe.

Yes, mainframes. Big Iron. Those big ol' data-crunching behemoths regarded by some as the dinosaurs of the datacenter. Pundits have periodically predicted they'll go extinct -- or at least pondered aloud how long they'd be around.

But mainframes have continued to evolve -- and seemingly thrive. According to both IBM and IDC research, mainframes sales remain strong. And with green fever infecting the business world, Big Blue hopes that Big Iron will soon be regarded as Big Green Machinery.

As part of its billion-dollar Project Big Green endeavor, IBM revealed this week that it's partaking of a giant bowl of its own dog food, moving the workload of 3,900 of its 8,500 servers to 30 virtualized System z9 mainframes running Linux. (Yes, Big Blue says it will properly recycle those machines.)

"The cost of energy, power to run computers, storage, and networking equipment, as well as the power to the cooling equipment, is becoming the highest single cost of managing a datacenter," says David Gelardi, VP of industry solutions at IBM. "IBM took a look at these very interesting plums coming to the forefront at the same time. We have an opportunity with systems management tools, with Linux, and with virtualization, to be able to take the workloads that are principally running on much smaller, underutilized Unix servers and move them over to those 30 very large mainframes."

Big Blue anticipates the move from 3,900 servers to 30 mainframes will cut energy consumption by around 80 percent, a healthy cost savings no matter how you slice it. Specifically, the company anticipates reducing its total annual energy consumption, including power and cooling, from 3,266 kilowatts to 629, and total expenses from $2.86 million to $551,000.

Reports from Robert Frances Group (RFG) lend credence to IBM's claims that mainframes can deliver processing power more efficiently than standard servers. In a white paper titled "Mainframe Computing and Power in the Data Center" dated Feb. 16, 2007, RFG reports the following:

"Mainframe systems consume less power, both in absolute and relative terms [than standard servers]. Typically, mainframe power densities are less than half of those of current rack and blade distributed systems. When looking at like workloads, the amount of energy consumed falls precipitously, in some cases the costs associated for power needed for an application are reduced by a factor of 600."

Part of the can be attributed to the fact that "mainframes are designed with a central AC/DC power converter, which operates at over
90 percent efficiency, compared with many existing rack server power converters which operate at 70 percent," according to a separate RFG report.

Also a boon: more precious floor space, moving from 11,045 square feet of occupied space to 1,643 square feet with the 30 mainframes.

Is IBM's Big Iron also Big Green?, IBM, project big green, mainframes, big iron Meet the machines
IBM's z9 mainframes are 64-bit machines, packing "specialty processors" designed for processing eligible Linux, Java, and data workloads as well as encrypting and decrypting certain data.

The machines' HiperSockets technology provides fast communication among all the virtual servers contained in a single machine, according to IBM. "By contrast, in a distributed environment, where many physical servers are connected by networking cables, lag time may be greater," the company argues.

Additionally, IBM says the machines can handle massive workloads. "The mainframe recently achieved the world's largest core banking benchmark result, delivering a record 9,445 business transactions per second in real time based on more than 380 million accounts with three billion transaction histories."

"Thank God for Linux."
Green ambitions -- both in terms of ecofriendliness and slicing energy bills -- are just part of the picture here. Linux's maturity stands to boost the mainframe's appeal, Gelardi says. "If you were to talk to just about any software company in the world, they would tell you the same story: "Thank God for Linux, because the 37 Unix variants were making us crazy. Linux is attractive because it's ubiquitous. You couldn't find too many products in the industry that don't support Linux."

Also appealing, according to Gelardi: the potential savings on software licenses, which are generally sold on a per-CPU basis. Moving from 3,900 servers, which might have, on the low end, 7,800 CPUs, to the 30 mainframes, which represent, at most, 1,920 CPUs (64 per mainframes), means a substantial reduction in software bills.

Finally, IBM is making the fairly familiar case the having fewer machines means you can free up IT staff to work on other projects.

Geraldi stresses that the mainframe isn't suited for all server tasks, which is why the company isn’t trading it its remaining 4,000-plus servers for mainframes. Typically, mainframes have been used for bulk-data processing tasks such as ERP and financial transaction processing. "There are lots of workloads that will still favor other architectures. We do not today, and as far as I can tell, for the future, have this notion of this being one size fits all."

Posted by Ted Samson on August 2, 2007 03:00 AM

August 01, 2007 | Comments: (0)

Update: Web-host company fully embraces solar

Correction: In the original version of this article, I mistakenly suggested that Greenest Host was the owner of the solar-powered datacenter I discuss. The facility belongs to AISO; Greenest Host is leasing a portion of the datacenter for its Web-hosting operation.

Additionally, I reported that Greenest Host is running 600 servers. They say they've reserved enough space to run as many as 600, though at the time of writing, they are unable to provide a specific figure.

I apologize for any confusion I may have caused.

InfoWorld: New Web-host company fully embraces solar While large companies such as Microsoft and Google have gingerly plugged in to the sun's energy, a newly announced Web host called Greenest Host is fully basking in it, with much thanks to AISO (Affordable Internet Service Online).

Following the lead of other companies seeking to boast green credentials, San Diego, Calif.-based Greenest Host has set up its Web-host service in AISO's 100-percent solar-powered datacenter. The facility is located in the inland desert of Southern California where its solar panels can soak up the sun year 'round.

The appeal of being a fully solar-powered company was strong for the company's CEO Mike Corrales. "Personally, my core values tend to skew toward green application and green causes," he says. "We wanted to make it really easy for end consumers and small businesses to be able to build their own Web sites in a way that coincided with their own personal value system."

According to Phil Nail, founder of AISO, many organizations have been turning to his company's hosting services for similar reasons. "We've seen a lot of that," says Nail. "Even out of the U.K, they're really coming out of the woodwork. A lot of companies have decided to resell our service."

By day, AISO's servers feed directly off the panels. By night, they get their power from batteries that store the excess solar energy. But the company has a backup plan. "[AISO.net] has a backup generator that runs on propane, just in case there is a shortage, or for some reason, we went 30 days in a row without sun," says Corrales.

Inside the datacenter, AISO runs new AMD Opteron-powered servers, "which use 60 percent less energy and generate 50 percent less heat" than the previous generation, according to the company.

"[AISO] worked closely with AMD to make sure that we have the best possible solution for our green datacenter. Because of their willingness to literally work hand-in-hand through the entire design and development process of the datacenter infrastructure, [AISO] felt that AMD was and still is the only way to go," says Corrales.

And, of course, AISO employs virtualization (from VMWare, specifically) "to reduce cooling and electrical requirements with a 30:1 ratio of virtual servers to physical servers."

For cooling, AISO uses two Energy Star-compliant systems from Freus. The cooling systems monitor outside air temperature, according to the Greenest Host, and when it reaches 50 degrees or below, "they suck the outside air in, filter it, and direct it into the datacenter, thus saving electricity when it's cool outside."

Moreover, AISO employs redundant environmental monitors from APC. These act as smoke alarms, but they also monitor humidity and cooling levels. "In case of a cooling issue, our support staff is notified immediately. This ensures all servers are maintained in a cool environment, which will prolong the life of the servers," according to the company.

The datacenter itself is built from steel and multiple layers of environmentally friendly insulation, the company says. The design keeps the cool air in and the hot air out, thus reducing the amount of energy necessary to run the facility.

AISO is also in the process of adding a green roof, which it says will reduce cooling and heating requirements by up to 50 percent. (A green roof, essentially, is a layer of soil and vegetation atop a building.)

Moreover, the company has a to-do list of other innovative and eco-friendly projects, according to Nail. "We are adding an underground water-storage tank to recycle grey water. Next, we are installing a new solar-panel automated-washing device we created. This will automatically wash the solar panels each morning, and all excess water will be filtered back into the storage tank. We'll also be using the storage tank water to water our landscape," he tells me via e-mail.

Given the green wave that's swept the business world, Corrales anticipates organizations will be lured by the eco-friendly nature of the service. "We can have an ethically superior choice available for people, but they don't have to sacrifice higher performance," he says. "Our pricing is pretty in line with all the major standard Web-hosting options out there."

Greenest Host will open to the public on Aug. 1. For more information, go to greenesthost.com. For more information about AISO, go to aiso.net.

Posted by Ted Samson on August 1, 2007 01:31 PM

April 03, 2007 | Comments: (0)

PG&E dangles cash as virtualization incentive

PG&E dangles cash as virtualization incentive How would you like to have your monthly data-center energy bills dramatically slashed while freeing up precious rack space, without taking a performance hit? Not a sweet enough deal? What if up to $4 million in cash incentives was thrown into the pot?

I know: It sounds like one of those late-night pitches you see in between re-runs of "Mama's Family" at 2:00 in the morning ("It's a salad spinner! It's an appetite suppressant! It's a powerful adhesive, and a stool loosener -- plus it brings you inner-peace!"). But this the real deal: If you consolidate your datacenter server hardware through virtualization, PG&E will pay you cash for each server you end up removing. (You have to be a PG&E customer to participate, though other utilities are offering similar deals.)

InfoWorld has, of course, been beating the virtualization drum for a while now, but perhaps those compelling rhythms haven't reached your ears, despite the datacenter power crises organizations are facing. The idea behind virtualization is, you create virtual machines on a few servers so that they can do the work of multiple servers -- thus rendering the latter unnecessary. Pretty simple, in theory, though if you want to dig down into the all-important hows and how-tos, check out our previous coverage.

Management advantages and cool factor aside, the energy savings -- and resulting cash savings and environmental benefits -- of virtualization are quite alluring. In fact, I'd say that virtualization has to be one of the most important sustainable technologies of our time in that it simultaneously addresses critical and intertwined business and environmental needs.

Participation in PG&E's Virtualization/Server Consolidation Projects Incentive program is pretty straightforward:

Develop a virtualization plan. Whichever virtualization company you decide to go with (VMware, VirtualIron, etc.) should be able to assist you with that.
Download, fill out, and submit your application to PG&E, which should include an inventory of what servers currently have running and what will remain once you've virtualized. A member of PG&E's HTEE (High Tech Energy Efficiency) team can assist you in the process.
Let PG&E perform calculations and determine what kind of cash incentive it will offer. You can expect between $150 and $300 for each server you unplug, according to PG&E HTEE Program Manager Mark Bramfitt.
Implement the plan (and be sure to recycle your hardware. Plenty of companies, including IBM, Sun, and HP, have notable hardware recycling and reuse programs that could reap you cash or credit toward other purchases.)
Let PG&E come by to ensure you've done what you said you'd do.
Receive incentive check.
Enjoy significantly lower energy bills and increased rack space while taking satisfaction in knowing that your company is producing fewer greenhouse gas emissions.

Frankly, the incentive is really just the tip of the savings iceberg, compared to the decrease you'll see in your energy bills. Each server you remove represents between $600 and $1,200 in energy saved on electricity and cooling, according to Bramfitt.

Bramfitt said that companies of all sizes have already participated. The United States Postal Service in the Bay Area is in the process of cutting away more than 5,000 of its 6,000 server through virtualization. Smaller companies, such as AutoDesk, went from 230 to 13. Even companies with as few as 30 servers have gotten on board, he said.

The incentive program launched late last year, a result of fruitful conversations with VMware. But it won't going to be around forever, Bramfitt noted. "Once we get to 50 or 60% adoption, will get out of this incentive program. It will become standard practice, and companies won't need an incentive to move forward."

For more information about PG&E's Virtualization/Server Consolidation Projects Incentive, as well as an application, go to www.pge.com/biz/rebates/hightech/htee_incentives.html. (While you're there, check out some of the other resources on the site. The utlity offers a host of best practices and incentive and rebate programs for saving electricity.)

If you're not in PG&E's jurisdiction, contact your local utility anyway and see if they have any similar programs. And if they don't, ask why the heck not?

Posted by Ted Samson on April 3, 2007 06:00 AM

April 03, 2007 | Comments: (0)

PG&E dangles cash as virtualization incentive

Participation in PG&E's Virtualization/Server Consolidation Projects Incentive program is pretty straightforward:

Develop a virtualization plan. Whichever virtualization company you decide to go with (VMware, VirtualIron, etc.) should be able to assist you with that.
Download, fill out, and submit your application to PG&E, which should include an inventory of what servers currently have running and what will remain once you've virtualized. A member of PG&E's HTEE (High Tech Energy Efficiency) team can assist you in the process.
Let PG&E perform calculations and determine what kind of cash incentive it will offer. You can expect between $150 and $300 for each server you unplug, according to PG&E HTEE Program Manager Mark Bramfitt.
Implement the plan (and be sure to recycle your hardware. Plenty of companies, including IBM, Sun, and HP, have notable hardware recycling and reuse programs that could reap you cash or credit toward other purchases.)
Let PG&E come by to ensure you've done what you said you'd do.
Receive incentive check.
Enjoy significantly lower energy bills and increased rack space while taking satisfaction in knowing that your company is producing fewer greenhouse gas emissions.

If you're not in PG&E's jurisdiction, contact your local utility anyway and see if they have any similar programs. And if they don't, ask why the heck not?

Posted by Ted Samson on April 3, 2007 06:00 AM

Technology White Papers

InfoWorld Technology Marketplace

» Technology White Papers Library

Technology White Papers by Topic

Technology White Papers E-mail Alert