Increase data center reliability and resiliency

As mission critical operations, data centers are already sited, designed, and operated with reliability and resiliency needs in mind. While there can be the perception that energy efficiency is at odds with resiliency and reliability, they can work synergistically. Energy efficiency measures can extend the life of existing facilities. Outages can be costly – with a recent survey pinning the average cost at over $700,000. Outages, whether manmade or natural, stand poised to continue to increase with climate change or with malicious attacks. Integrating renewable energy sources (whether solar, hydro, wind, or geothermal) into operations is one increasingly popular path to heightened data center resiliency. According to AFCOM’s 2018 State of the Data Center Industry report, approximately 42% of respondents have or are planning to deploy renewable energy over the next year. Most of these respondents also indicated that they expect this will lower their overall data center total cost of ownership (TCO).