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| UPSonNet NewsLetter May 2011 |
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Editorial Topic by Meir Portnoy: The Hunt for more Efficient UPS Solutions.
Increasing UPS system efficiency becomes the name of the game in today's competitive IT
environment, sometimes overriding or coming on expense of other concerns such as performance,
reliability and availability.
Making our world greener is the main force, driving the initiatives aimed to increase efficiency and
decrease pollution, translated in data center environment by The Green Grid consortium to Power
Usage Effectiveness (PUE) figure, derived by the ratio of total facility power to IT equipment
power.
The PUE ratio, which goes hand in hand with management's objective to decrease costs and
increase profit, became a measurable figure to asses Data Center effectiveness, practically
achieved by requesting data center managers to take the necessary steps to reduce it.
The pressure to decrease PUE's efficiency is also guided by examples such as Facebook's
declaration by its VP of Technical Operations in April 2011 about achieving a remarkable 1.07 PUE
figure. Facebook does not provide sufficient information, to learn which items entered the
calculation, but other industry participants believe that a PUE figure of 1.7 is achievable.
IT power, frequently measured as the output power drawn from the UPS to power computer
servers, is entered in the denominator of the PUE equation. Server's power consumption is
currently affected by continuous reduction trend in Data centers due introduction of new
equipment, built to comply with recent Green oriented legislations. Energy Star standard for
instance requires increasing computer power supply efficiency by almost 80%, while decreasing
standard 1U single CPU server's idle power to 55W instead of about 250Watt dissipated by the
legacy type.
Reduction of IT power drawn from the UPS increases automatically the PUE figure of the facility,
which includes additional power wasting components, such as lights, ventilation, emergency and
UPS systems, which are unaffected (at least in the short term) by reducing critical equipment
power. The reduced server's consumption causes, in addition, oversized UPS capacities, which
also exhibit low efficiency at reduced load.
Consistent pressure is therefore exerted on Data Center IT and facility Mangers to decrease the
PUE figure, by reducing the wasted power and increasing UPS efficiency. This desires to take the
necessary steps to monitor consistently the PUE figure and demonstrate continuous reduction by
designing and implementing a proper action plan.
Energy Star has recently published a draft of UPS product specification, which will become
effective on September 1, 2011. The specification requires 98% efficiency from Voltage and
Frequency Dependent Systems (VFD) like standby types, 97% efficiency from Voltage
Independent systems, such as Line Interactive, and UPS efficiency figure which starts with 81%,
increasing as a function of UPS power, for voltage and frequency independent systems like online
double conversion systems.
Energy Star method of calculating efficiency of all types, takes in account 25%, 50%, and 75%
loading on the UPS. Currently most manufacturers provide mainly full load efficiency, and do not
state the needed information to calculate conformance with these requirements. The specification
presents also results of about 100 tested units from several manufacturers, which indicate that
70% do not comply with the new standard.
UPS manufacturers have already picked up the gauntlet, by continuously presenting new systems,
new operation modes and new managing software which enables a dramatic increase of UPS
efficiency. The following examples, based on briefs published on UPSonNet News, indicate that
almost month by month a new UPS system or feature is introduced, dealing with and offering
better efficiency:
1. Online UPS systems offering high efficiency at reduced loads.
In February 2011 APC announces new parallel capabilities of the Symmetra® PX 250/500kW
three-phase modular and hot-scalable UPS Systems, enabling to deliver up to 1.5MW with N+1
Redundancy, which feature 96% efficiency down to 35% loading.
2. High power UPS systems designed to work part time in Eco mode regime.
In March 2011 Emerson Network Power, introduced the Liebert APM, Online Modular 45kW and
90kW three phase 208 V UPS frames, for North and South American market. The systems allow
UPS scaling for capacity or redundancy with 15kW hot swappable modules. The UPS feature 94%
efficiency from 50% to 100% load, input
3. UPS systems able to turn off idle peripherals.
In March 2011 APC announces New PowerChute™ Business Edition 9.0 software which enables
to configure the exact sequence by which equipment shuts down and restarts so that more critical
servers stay online longer, and have the ability to power off less critical equipment under certain
conditions to conserve runtime.
4. Managing software able to turn off unused UPS systems.
In May 2011 APC releases high Efficiency Booster Mode (EBM) operation for MGE Galaxy 7000
UPS systems connected in parallel. According to APC, the new EBM features offers to realize up
to 30% energy savings by enabling UPS systems to be right-sized to meet load conditions or
redundancy requirements, by automatically placing underutilized UPS power modules into sleep
(standby) mode when system load is much lower than the installed capacity.
5. Modular high efficiency systems.
In February 2011 A Kohler UPS Ltd introduces The Powerwave – 5000-TP modular three phase
online UPS family, designed primarily for server rooms and data centers, which offers UPS
Modules from 10 to 50kVA with efficiency of 95% online mode and 98% in Eco mode.
These examples relate to new equipment and software introduced during the last few months, but
the trend to increase efficiency, is on its way quite for some time; in October 2009 for instance,
Chloride ( now Emerson ) has introduced the Trinergy UPS, same month Eaton introduced its
Energy Saver UPS, more examples are presented on UPSonNet article titled " Raising UPS
efficiency with Eco Mode."
The above examples present a spectrum of solution available to data center manager to choose
from in order to increase facility's PUE. For maximum results, a strategy aimed to redesign the
existing infrastructure should be formed, taking in account current utilization and efficiencies of
computer servers and UPS systems, as well as future needs and expected returns, which can be
realized by replacing or upgrading existing servers and UPS systems.
I welcome remarks. Please send to: meirp@upsonnet.com
UPSonNet Website News
New subscribers can now access latest Newsletters by clicking on the relevant title under 2011
heading on UPSonNet home page, and 2010 Newsletters by linking here to December script titled:
Power UPS Insights Problems and Solutions, which is leading to all 2010 Newsletters.
UPS Industry News
Several News items briefed on UPSonNet News during May 2011 offer important information of
interest to industry participants:
Emerson's Report and Ponemon's study, also sponsored by Emerson, provide information
concerned with the cost of Data center outages, including statistic detailing the cause of outages,
frequencies, duration, average recovery time and more.
Frost& Sullivan research forecasts impressive growth of Modular UPS market in Europe at an
annual rate of 15.4 %to reach $ 404.7 Million in 2017, indicating that the market will compete on
price, quality, reliability and availability.
Brief and of the Energy Star UPS Product Specification Draft, considered in the editor's topic is
also presented on May News page.
We welcome remarks on any Newsletter issue. Please e-mail to: denis@upsonnet.com
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