By virtue of its name, starting from the days of the mainframe, we traditionally tend to think of the “data center” as the central point for the data processing, storage, as well as the nexus of the data network.

A long time ago in the mid-1990s, Ken Brill, Jedi Knight, brilliantly created the concept of a “tier system of availability” based primarily on the redundancy level of the facility power and cooling infrastructure, and subsequently founded the Uptime Institute (UI).

The enterprise and colocation data center operators are infused with a risk adverse culture.

Liquid cooling (LC) has been used since the early mainframe days and to cool some supercomputers.

Welcome to 2017, and as predicted in my “Show Me the Money” prognosis, the digital ecosystem continues to expand exponentially.

As is my usual practice for this annual predictions column, I asked the official Hot Aisle Insight crystal ball for guidance.

W hen it comes to the basic elements of data center critical infrastructure and especially the power chain, I tend toward the conservative approach.

In my last column, I wrote about the fate on the enterprise data.

In my last column I discussed the net zero energy data center. While to some it may seem like an oxymoron or a punch line to a joke, however to one degree or another, it may become a necessity in the not too distant future. Nonetheless, today energy efficiency, as well as the energy usage by all data centers, continues to be an ongoing and high-profile target for environmental and sustainability groups, as well as the government. 

In my last column I discussed the proposed ASHRAE 90.4 Data Center Energy Efficiency standard. At the time the article published, the second revision for comment (September 2015) mandated a PUE  ranging from 1.3 to 1.6, dependent on its location in the 18 geographic zones.