Developing Australia's highest density data centres

IT company Digital Sense is using multi-million dollar infrastructure technology from Emerson Network Power Australia to develop Australia's highest density data centres, to support the growing demand from Australia's largest government and corporate organisations.

The first of two data centres is being commissioned in Kenmore, Brisbane, which will be the first purpose-built, high-density data centre in Australia. When finished, it will operate at 2000 W/m2 of floor space (with a floor area of 1600 m2). The largest data centres currently in operation top out at less than 1000 W per square.

Digital Sense is also building a second data centre with Emerson, code-named Data Centre City, with a total area of 10,000 m2. Data Centre City will supersede Kenmore with a capacity of 6500 W/m2 to become Australia's largest high-density facility. It will also support up to 25 kW of cooling per rack with Emerson's supplemental cooling technology.

"High density computing is a reality in today's highly competitive, information-driven global economy, and demand is outstripping supply for the highest possible performance and security from outsourced data centre facilities," said Michael Tran, director of Digital Sense.

"The problem we face in Australia " and the niche that we're looking to fill " is the lack of true high-density data centres. We have large and successful facilities in Australia, but none of them are purpose-built to support true high-density computing across every metre of floor space, and that's where we come in."

Tran said that demand is particularly strong from large government departments, Australia's mining conglomerates, large corporate operations, web hosting services and medical industries.

"These companies can't run their operations without top-notch information systems working 24/7 to support millions of customers around Australia and around the world," he said.

"They're also bound by strict corporate governance laws, so backup and recovery services " which often means locating equipment in multiple secure sites " are never far from the top of their list."

Tran added that all this power comes at a price.

"Aside from the initial challenges - of finding a secure site well removed from obvious hazards, like bushfires and flight paths and located close enough to a power grid that can supply the power we need to keep the equipment running reliably " we then have the not-so-small issue of keeping that equipment cool and ensuring adequate resilience for any eventuality," Tran said.

Emerson's solution for Digital Sense includes:

• the aluminium-frame Knurr racks, to hold multiple blade servers in place without putting significant added weight on the floor supports or compromising airflow;
• Liebert UPSs, to filter clean power from the grid and to protect the dual power and communication feeds going into each rack;
• ASCO switches, to reliably convert from mains power to generator power in the event of a blackout, or routine maintenance without downtime; and
• the Liebert X-Treme Density (XD) supplemental cooling system, to support scalable rack cooling from as little as 1 kW to more than 25 kW per rack.

"Emerson's adaptive architecture means that Digital Sense can establish a customer at a relatively small base and quickly expand their equipment without having to upgrade or change the support infrastructure," said Mark Deguara, National Product Manager at Emerson Network Power Australia.

"It's like plug and play cooling. For example, a blade server can be added to an existing rack and the XD cooling system will dynamically adapt to the extra heat rejection by simply plugging in an additional cooling pipe. It takes minutes to add additional cooling capacity, as the click-connect system requires no tools and there is no disruption to the IT equipment.

"With the advent of these new facilities, gone are the days that companies have to move their equipment to another location once they've outgrown their initial power requirements."

Digital Sense conducted extensive research at some of the world's largest high-density data centres in the United States to get a better understanding of the logistics required to design, build and operate a similar facility in Australia.

"We discovered that capacities of 30 " 40 kW per rack would be very feasible in the next two to three years," said Tran.

"That's why it's so important to get the right mix of infrastructure from the start. The more expensive it is to power and cool the equipment, the more expensive the operating costs. Making the wrong infrastructure choices at the design stage can potentially cripple a high-density data centre in the long run."

Construction has already started on Digital Sense's Kenmore data centre, which will be open for business later this year. Data Centre City, still in the planning stages, is also expected to come online sometime in 2008.