Economizer Analyses - Layer 42, Santa Clara, CA
Category: Data Center
Square Footage: 24,785 sq ft
Services Provided: HVAC, Plumbing
Completion Date: 2010
Owner: Layer 42
Construction Manager: Matrix CM
Mechanical Contractor: Southland Industries
Layer 42, a small data center in Santa Clara, was designed without any economizers. The cooling equipment was past its useful life and needed to be replaced. Pragmatic PE was hired to develop options for reducing the electrical power dedicated to cooling so that it could be diverted into powering racks—the source of income for Layer 42. A previous engineer had recommended airside economizers, but Pragmatic PE noticed that the adjacency of the white space to the exterior walls would also allow for evaporative cooling solutions.
Pragmatic PE generated a life cycle cost analysis for three options:
Replacing the equipment like-for-like with energy efficient units
Installing airside economizers to like-for-like equipment
Replacing the existing cooling equipment with evaporative cooling.
The net present value of the first two options did not have significant added benefits of diverting facility power to servers like the third option. The net present value of each option, given the lower energy costs and increased server power of the third option, was $17.7-million, $19.7-million, and $50.3-million, respectively. The evaporative cooling option recommended by Pragmatic PE was the best choice by far as shown by the life cycle cost analyses that Pragmatic PE generated.