This was one of those conferences so full of energy, content, excitement, and thought leaders that even with two clones there was no way to capture it all. Fortunately for those who are Green Grid members (hint, time to join especially with new membership levels) all of the presentations, both public and members-only, are available for downloading.
As Emerson’s board representative to The Green Grid I was delighted with the tremendous community participation and the degree of professionalism from the numerous member companies in attendance. It is truly a rare and wonderful experience to work together with one’s industry peers towards common, practical, and sometimes behavior changing goals of energy and resource efficiency.
What follows are items of note, interest, and sometimes amusement from the forum that caught my attention starting with the kick-off welcome and introduction by John Tuccillo, Schneider, President & Chairman of The Green Grid who spoke about this being the five-year anniversary of Green Grid, the numerous accomplishments achieved in near record time for an industry association, the global reach and impact of the cast body of work, and the future direction and growth of Green Grid as we move from PUE and metrics/technical to the broader scope of resource efficient computing ecosystems. A very moving and informative launch to the two-day event which was almost filled to capacity with a record turn-out approaching 300 attendees fro industry, academia, and government.
First up for the two-day event was a panel discussion on Data Center 2025. This was a very dynamic panel with a great deal of interaction and audience participation. A topic I’ll come back to in the very near future.
Several break-out sessions followed and without the use of my clones it was difficult to stay on top of all of the great content. Again, if you are a member go download the presentations. It isn’t the same as being in the room for the Q&A sessions or the incredible hallway discussion. So next year plan on attending!
I managed to catch the container / modular data center facilities presentation by Christopher Kelley, Cisco, reporting out on the work of the container task force. These aren’t your grandparents Airstream trailers! (Note: I’d love to have an Airstream just because they are so cool) Summary: containers have started to turn the corner in market acceptance and are certainly worthy of consideration in a data center project. An interesting task force to follow especially in light of Dean Nelson’s, eBay, comments on project Mercury.
There were two equally interesting concurrent sessions on server power management (we’ve covered this before and I still call on you to use the off switch) and an update on measuring data center energy productivity that was led by Zeydey Ortiz, Ph.D., IBM, who was recognized for her excellent leadership and tremendous work within Green Grid with an award later in the day.
I missed the EDE: Electronics Disposal Efficiency presentation, similar to MRR, material recycling ratio, (EDE of 75% into the bin from 6 feet is my best so far) by John Pflueger, Dell, and the CIM profiles presentation led by John Haas, Intel, member of Board of Directors, Kiyokazu Saigo, Hitachi, and Hemal Shah, Broadcom, in order to catch the ASHRAE Class Changes presentation by Don Beaty, DLB Assoc. Consulting Engineers. Don is always a great presenter and this session was another great example of his ability to use technology to keep the audience engaged. Summary: the point is don’t be a point. Be a range. Meaning control your data center environment to a range and not a specific point to take better advantage of ASHRAE limits, hysteresis of the building systems, local environment, and your hardware vendors’ warranties.
My business obligations took priority in the early afternoon so I missed the session on Comparing AC and DC power systems from a reliability basis led by Harry Handlin, GE Energy, Bill Campbell, Emerson Network Power, and Mark Murrill, Emerson Network Power which I understand was very well attended. At the same time Mark Blackburn, 1E, presented a new data center storage efficiency metric while Michael Patterson, Ph.D., Intel, discussed free cooling maps and the Green Grid’s economizer survey results. Good thing this is all available to download as I’m travelling next week and can use the time to get caught up.
In the interest of brevity I’ll cut the running overview short. If you weren’t there you missed a great panel discussion entitled Sparks Fly! Which dealt with the topic of AC and/or DC in the data center. Bottom line, do your research and decide for yourself. Final keynote by Chandrakant Patel, HP, had the entire audience in stitches between the vegetable vendor workload analogies to why our youth need to learn a real skill, and how information technology and data centers is changing our way of life.
That was just day one. If you also missed the second day – time to go download the content!
Also, with the many new membership levels this really is the time to become a member of the Green Grid and attend Forum 2013, which will be held in the San Jose, CA Convention Center as we maxed out this year’s venue.
Email me if you would like more information on Green Grid membership, activities, and areas for engagement. Or send me a tweet @JackPouchet.
Jack Pouchet is director of energy initatives for Emerson Network Power. He brings more than 20 years related experience, is an active member of The Green Grid, and is frequently engaged with federal and state agencies in research and legislation centered on alternative and renewable energy.