Schneider Electric has announced the public availability of reference designs for data center infrastructure systems. These project planning tools offer documented and validated plans detailing how physical infrastructure systems are to be configured, interconnected, and laid out, as well as which specific components are to be used within the system. Pre-engineered and developed from proven experience, reference designs can simplify and shorten projects while ensuring more predictable results.

“Customers of all types — from enterprise to co-location to cloud providers — place a high value on the ability to simplify and reduce the time needed to plan and design a data center project,” said Kevin Brown, vice president, Global Data Center Offer at Schneider Electric. “And for many, it is neither practical nor cost effective to completely engineer all aspects of a unique data center. Schneider Electric’s data center reference designs help customers obtain this value by providing them with an easy to way to rapidly and accurately compare design alternatives.”

Schneider Electric’s Data Center Reference Designs have been developed to simplify and speed up projects. Compared to the traditional “blank piece of paper” design approach, reference designs are a great tool for moving through the early planning phase and into the detailed design much faster, saving several weeks, if not months, of precious and costly time. With Schneider Electric’s designs, high quality decisions regarding the key project parameters (e.g., capacity, criticality, density, efficiency, and budget) can all be made quickly and effectively. By having key stakeholders determine and agree on these parameters early in the planning phase, engineering firms can be consulted sooner and the number of time-consuming design iterations that are common with the traditional approach will be greatly reduced.

Acting as a common platform and language for discussion, reference designs are a great starting point for any new or retrofit project. With over 50 designs available today, this library will evolve and grow over time as new design concepts are developed, documented, and validated.

To access the designs via the Reference Design Selector visit www.DataCenterDesigns.Schneider-Electric.com. Design summary documents can be downloaded which describe and list each design’s standardized performance attributes. Each design has an engineering package containing one-line drawings, piping diagrams, bill of materials and floor layouts. Each design’s engineering package is available by request.