It was estimated that at least one-third of all data would pass through the cloud by 2020. But before large amounts of data can be sent to other parties, it needs to be hosted in a reliable and efficient data center.

Data center maintenance is a broad topic, but it has much to do with making systems and processes as efficient as possible. Improved efficiency reduces costs for businesses and uses less energy in the process, which is good for the environment.

Whether your company is already moving towards a more energy-efficient future or you don’t know where to begin, keep reading to learn some ways data center services can make your data facility more efficient.

Measure to Manage

Before you can make appropriate changes to an existing system, you must have a reliable way to measure the system’s output as it is. Without a way to measure your results, any attempts at optimization will simply be shots in the dark.

To reduce energy inefficiencies, you need to begin with baseline measurements. Seeing where your power is going will tell you where to focus your attention. Energy consumption is typically measured based on categories including IT systems, UPS, chillers, and lighting.

Audit Data

Every company should occasionally run an audit of their business data. This is especially important if it has been a few years since an extensive audit was performed. Data auditing is also an important part of data center maintenance because it improves efficiency when you streamline existing data and eliminate unneeded information.

Even professional data centers can end up with outdated, incomplete, and duplicate data that takes up storage space needlessly. Without a careful data audit, these junk files will be redistributed and backed up repeatedly over time, resulting in expensive and inconvenient data bloat.

When you delete unnecessary data, not only do you free up storage for important information to be stored, but you also save energy by reducing the amount of storage your company needs in the first place.

Eliminate Overcooling

It is easy for IT departments to miscalculate how much data center cooling is necessary. This results in overcooling and overspending on air conditioning.

If your company is like most others, your systems probably do not run at peak capacity very often. However, if your cooling systems are operating as if they are all the time, you are wasting energy and possibly losing significant amounts of money.

Overcooling is a commonly made mistake because accurately calculating how power loads is difficult. To determine reasonable power-load estimates, it is best to test your equipment in a lab environment before deploying it in your data center. Tests like these will show you what power loads to expect from your systems in the future. You can monitor power usage and tune your cooling systems accordingly over time. In this way, air conditioning for data centers can be a significant area for efficiency improvement.

Remember Physics

If you find that your cooling systems must be operating near max capacity to keep your data center cool, you should consider rethinking your data center layout keeping physics in mind. At a basic level, this means remembering that hot air naturally rises and cold air falls. Because of this, data centers with raised floors usually demand more energy.

You may not be able to do much to change the elevation of your server racks, but you can at least arrange them so they are not causing significant heat buildup. If the server racks are set up incorrectly, one machine can vent hot exhaust into the air intake of another machine. One way to avoid this is to always place racks front-to-front and back-to-back. This arrangement is known as “hot aisle/cold aisle” and leads to improved data center maintenance and operating efficiency.

Not all data centers are created equal and how your company chooses to implement efficiency strategies will depend on your specific conditions. These ideas should give you some good places to start. Your data center maintenance department can also develop appropriate improvements that are unique to your business and facility.

For even more answers and support, contact LDP for mission critical support solutions for your data center.