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Optimizing Data Center Power with Software-Defined Power and Cooling

By Erin Harrison, Executive Editor, Cloud Computing

Measuring and monitoring data center power volumes is critical for energy efficiency, productivity, cost savings and capacity planning. Without operating with optimized power and cooling, software-defined data centers can cost significantly more.

To overcome the challenges of reliability and optimization of resources, software-defined power and cooling need to be part of the overall equation, according to Clemens Pfeiffer, CTO of Power Assure.

Data Center Infrastructure Management (DCIM) software – coupled with energy market integration that has a detailed model of power consumption, cooling, and the ability to manage servers, turning them on or off or putting them in a lower power state – allows for software-defined data center to be realized, he maintains.

Market research firm Enterprise Management Associates (EMA (News - Alert)) recently published a report on the DCIM market, defining a basic framework for talking about DCIM solutions and identifying a list of vendors whose products excel within that framework. EMA defines DCIM as a solution that “enables a holistic view of the IT ecosystem that dynamically recognizes the relationships of one device to all others.”

“The ability to leverage analytics and detailed modeling capabilities to provide real-time visibility across complex IT ecosystems enables organization to optimize a variety of critical infrastructure support elements, including energy efficiency, heat distribution, space management, network connectivity and system performance,” the report explains.

Because most data centers were not built to optimize power and cooling, as a recent Forbes article pointed out, the actual and peak power consumption of equipment is often unknown because manufacturer specifications are designed to promote safety, not optimal use of power.

“As server utilization goes up because of increased efficiencies due to software defined data centers, the design of power and cooling must also be optimized,” according to the report. “As workloads move around more rapidly, data center management systems will have to have an accurate model of workloads, power consumption and cooling demand to keep up.

In summary, DCIM is essentially becoming the building management system and IT management system for the data center, enabling what a software-defined data center should be.