Data Center Energy Efficiency Savings Calculator

PUE Energy Efficiency Savings Calculator

Determine how much you can save by improving data center efficiency.

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Enter Current PUE

PUE

Enter Desired PUE

PUE

 

kW/h Cost

$

Total IT Load

kW

Current Efficiency Level

Total IT Load

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Total Facility Load

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Desired Efficiency Level

Desired IT Load

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Desired Facility Load

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Less kW/h Use

1 Year Savings

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5 Year Savings

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10 Year Savings

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Less Power Cost

1 Year Savings

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5 Year Savings

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10 Year Savings

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Less Carbon Tons

1 Year Savings

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5 Year Savings

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10 Year Savings

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Less Vehicles

1 Year Savings

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5 Year Savings

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10 Year Savings

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Understanding Data Center Energy Consumption and Estimating Energy Efficiency Savings

42U’s Data Center Efficiency Savings Calculator

helps IT Professionals and C-level management understand the short term and long term savings that can be achieved by improving the energy efficiency of their data center infrastructure. Efficiency savings are both financial (Capital expense (CAPEX) and operating expense (OPEX) as well as the environmental savings in carbon emissions (the carbon given off by the electricity used to power the equipment in their data centers). Also important to consider but beyond the scope of this calculator are the substantial CAPEX savings in reducing assets and deferred data center construction (see CAPEX vs OPEX discussion below), and savings in other green house gasses other than CO2. The Efficiency Savings Calculator is designed to be useful for determining savings for any size data center, computer room, server room, or wiring closet.

Data Center Efficiency CAPEX versus OPEX Savings

A more efficient data center eliminates many power and cooling capacity issues thus reducing the need to add additional power and cooling equipment assets, and potentially eliminating the need to either build a new data center or move to a larger data center space. Additional efficiency measures such as asset retirement, virtualization and consolidation reduce the floor square required by IT and infrastructure equipment. Though not illustrated in the savings shown by this calculator, the CAPEX costs savings in not have to build, design, and equip a new data center have been shown to be as much as 5-6 times the OPEX savings shown here for makings your data center more efficient. In addition to the financial CAPEX savings, any new equipment that doesn’t have to be manufactured, and any data center facility that doesn’t need to be built saves the unnecessary production of tons of CO2 & Green House Gases (GHG) emissions.

Using the Efficiency Calculator

• Current Efficiency Level

  Use the Current Efficiency Level Sliding Bar to enter your data center’s current PUE/DCiE. If you are just getting started in understanding your data center’s efficiency, PUE and DCiE are key efficiency benchmarks proposed by the Green Grid and widely accepted and adopted by the data center industry. Click here if you would like to learn more about what PUE and DCiE are. Even without having your data center’s PUE/DCiE calculations, you can estimate. The Uptime Institute approximates an industry average PUE of 2.5. But if you haven’t yet focused on improving your data center’s efficiency, your benchmarks may be less efficient.

• Efficiency Goal

  Not everyone is going to be able to achieve the impressive efficiency levels of a Google, Yahoo, or Microsoft (all have PUE’s of 1.15 to 1.21), but most data centers can make substantial efficiency improvements. The following chart showing data detailed by the EPA and presented by the Green Grid can help give you some ideas of achievable goals. After calculating your current PUE/DCiE, we recommend you set a realistic team efficiency improvement objective, use our calculator to determine the potential savings of achieving that improved level, and keeping in mind the environmental and goodwill benefits, weight the savings against the costs of your efficiency efforts.
  Also recommended is implementing some low cost/no costs efficiency strategies.

• Costs per kilowatt (kWh)

  The “Select your State” drop down is helpful if you are located in the United States and aren’t familiar with what you are paying for your energy. The cost per kWh shown for each state are the official 2010 Average Retail Price of Electricity published by the Department of Energy (DOE) / Energy Information Administration (EIA). EIA’s average cents are presented in their chart and used in our calculator with four decimals. For example; 12 1/2 cents (USD $0.125) is shown and calculated as 12.50.

  • Override Value
    If you know the exact amount your company is paying for electricity (some large corporations have negotiated rates with their utility that are better than their state average), you can use the “Override Value” to enter the amount your organization actually pays instead of using the “Select your State” drop down.
  • Note for International users: Unfortunately it would not be practical to have a drop down for every country, but the override value is also useful for entering cost per kWh for other currencies. It will be more obvious to those in Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, and others who have dollar based currencies, but ignoring the dollar signs and different placement of numerical commas and periods, it also works accurately for those on the Sterling, Euro, or any other currency. The carbon emissions calculations used here however are based on the average Carbon emissions produced by the production of energy in the USA. The amount of Carbon produced depends on how cleanly the electricity is generated. Fossil fuels such as coal burn the most, wind, solar, geothermal, hydro power, and nuclear produce few or no CO2. This varies for each country and region.

• Enter Total IT Load

  If you have already calculated your PUE or DCiE you should already have your IT Load available to be entered. If not, you can gather this information at your UPS or PDU. To learn how to calculate your IT Load see (Step 5: Find your Total IT Load in How to calculate your PUE/DCiE).

• Total Facility Load

  Your total facility load will be automatically calculated after you enter your current IT load and your PUE/DCiE. You would need to determine your facility load to determine your benchmarks. (see Step 4: Find your Total Facility Power in How to calculate your PUE/DCiE).

• Current Energy Output / Annual Data Center Efficiency Savings

  Too often there is a disconnect between the IT Professionals and management on the importance of efficiency. Uptime and redundancy are obviously primary concerns, but too few on either side are tracking how much energy their organization uses in a year, how much it is costing their company, and how much it is costing environmentally. Because of the divide between facilities and IT, some data center managers don’t yet grasp the significance of energy costs in their data centers. This calculator brings these expenses to light and also quantifies the savings possible through efficiency improvements. Also, too few on either side scrutinize their utility bill or calculate their data center’s annual power costs, and determine if savings are possible. Our hope is that based on the 4 pieces of readily available data you can enter in this calculator (Current and Desired PUE/DCiE, IT Load, and Cost per kWh), it will help all parties appreciate the value of their efficiency efforts. In the very near future this will become more apparent with our growing data center power and cooling capacity issues, carbon regulations on the horizon, and the growing importance of environmental goodwill. In the near future, more and more companies and consumers will insist on doing business with ethical companies who share their environmental concerns and which are taking appropriate measures to minimize their ecological footprint.