AUTOMSOFT and POWER ANALYTICS - Data Center White … 031714 for EI.pdf · AUTOMSOFT and POWER...

AUTOMSOFT and POWER ANALYTICS - Data Center White Space Management Realized

Executive Summary Power Analytics has been a leading edge provider of analytical software for the Data Center

market and related industries for over six years. In that time, Power Analytics has been involved

in some of the most significant advances in power and energy management in mission critical

data centers as well as in leading-edge markets involving the management of distributed

generation and load. In the course of this work, Power Analytics has partnered with several

companies that bring unique and timely solutions to the markets that Power Analytics serves.

One of those companies is Automsoft Corporation whose advanced data historian architecture,

RAPID™, has proven to be invaluable as a technology synergy partner bringing critical real-time

integration of data sources found in a typical data center.

This paper focuses on overcoming the limitations of current data center infrastructure

management practices by leveraging the technology partnership between Automsoft and Power

Analytics to greatly enhance the management of power distribution on the raised floor of a data

center the physical space in the data center where electric power is conveyed to the IT

equipment doing the work of the data center.

This space, the raised floor of the data center, is often referred to as the White Space.

The management of the power infrastructure of the White Space is what Power Analytics and

Automsoft define as White Space Management (WSM)

Paraic O’Toole Kevin MeagherPresident President & CTOAutomsoft Power Analytics Corporation

March 2014


The Historical Perspective

Of Hardware Provisioning

Of Panel Schedules

Of Rack Schedules

There are volumes and volumes of documentation, white papers, best business practices, and

related material on the activities of a data center. This includes one aspect of the raised floor

area, which is the focus of this paper. As with other dynamic environments, the White Space,

(data hall, or raised floor) is constantly changing and evolving. A convenient way to encapsulate

this process is reviewing the activity of IT hardware provisioning. It is in the process of hardware

provisioning, and, in particular, that for an operating facility beyond the initial design and

commissioning phase that we are talking about today.

Typically, Power Analytics is involved in the earliest stages of data center design through the

commissioning phase providing a significant amount of hands on experience. In fact, Power

Analytics insists on a process that starts with a detailed design analysis of the power

infrastructure as a critical first step in any advanced power system from a mission critical data

center to a community microgrid or photovoltaic facility.

The initial build-out and commission has many critical steps, but what is generally true is the

dynamics of hardware provisioning are more relevant after the facility is operational. Once

operational, the hardware provisioning can become increasingly complicated.

Over the past several years, one of the most promising developments in the IT world …perhaps

over promised … has been data center infrastructure management. Other approaches to the

changes and the speed of change in a 21st century facility include concepts like that of the

software defined data center. All of these concepts are strategies to organize, optimize, and

increase the efficiency of operation and speed the availability of the IT assets.

The reality of the data center, however defined, is that somewhere there is hardware that must

perform according to stringent service level agreements and expectations of the operator or

owner. If not, customer satisfaction and enterprise profitability are sacrificed.


March 2014


While it is possible to create a solution that will address the initial conditions of a facility,

including the infrastructure provisioning, the inevitable process to expand, change and modify is

frequently a very difficult task, and often as not, stumbles and falls down.

Power Analytics has solved the daunting issues created by the pace of infrastructure re-

provisioning for some of the leading enterprise data center facilities for which there can be no

downtime … no compromise.

How? Where? What?

It is a fair to ask how, and the intent of this paper is targeting the solution to the problem, not the

problem philosophy.

The first step to the solution is the adoption of branch circuit monitoring or BCM. If power to the

IT equipment on the White Space is not monitored at the equivalent branch circuit level, then the

goals of data center infrastructure management - capacity, availability, and efficiency are

thwarted.

The overall market acceptance and penetration of BCM has increased steadily. This has

generated market studies and reports on products and technologies to solve the challenge of

designing hardware necessary to measure and monitor the critical values of voltage, current,

power factor and circuit breaker status (open/closed/tripped) from this entry point of power to the

raised floor area.

Branch Circuit Monitoring was developed originally to mitigate the labor-intensive, non-real time

practice of manual branch circuit power metering. Most companies offering a BCM solution feel

that because they provide a monitoring solution along with the hardware to provide Modbus-

level data on the circuits the problem is solved. However, installation of BCM is only a first step.

The fact that BCM vendors believe they have solved the problem is a fundamental indicator of

the level of disconnect with the solution. BCM is indeed a requirement, and one of the most

critical, but it is not a solution. The problem is not “monitoring” per se. The problem can be more

accurately described as an application problem. In fact, competing BCM products typically solve

the connectivity and components for their hardware, but do little to solve the application issue

especially in the mixed environments that many facilities operate in today.

The complexity of branch circuit power distribution to the rack can take the form of traditional

power distribution units, remote power panels, overhead busway or more frequently a hybrid of


March 2014


all these and more. These distribution variations further convolute the real issue of linking

power-consuming equipment with a specific location or “breaker”, while associating it, as

required, with a customer, an application or some critical identifying factor specific to the

business practices of the facility. This complexity is multiplied because the incoming power

circuits can be so called single pole (nominally 120V depending on the country), dual pole (208-

240V) or three pole (three phase 400-480V). Those power parameters can and do change, but

the only reference is to a “Modbus” register frequently managed in a text list or spreadsheet that

is exceptionally difficult and time consuming to change. Finally, this situation is further

complicated by identifying available rack space that has sufficient power, adequate cooling and

balanced loading.

The point of this is that rack management is a primary focus in many of the cases addressed by

leading asset management products, but the relationship to power including energy

consumption (kWH for example) so critical to managing energy cost, allocation of energy cost,

and service level agreements is virtually ignored.

The ultimate result is inconsistent data center profitability (it is a revenue-producing asset).

Consider a hosting company which may have multiple physical locations with vastly different

energy consumption. Inability to identify or accurately allocate power costs can result in

significant liabilities from “leaking” cash

As mentioned earlier, this is not a monitoring problem, nor in the case of Automsoft and Power

Analytics, a monitoring solution. This is very much a data and analytics problem the solution to

which is an approach that recognizes the need to tap into mixed sources of data, some real time

such as monitoring systems, some desktop in nature as many asset management practices,

while integrating and using all the sources in real time to address the problem optimally.


March 2014


Where to Start

As mentioned previously, the start begins with the assumption that monitoring of hardware and

other data sources such as asset management data, whether developed and used internally or

purchased from a vendor, exist. The vast majority of existing monitoring or data acquisition

systems will be in product solutions provided by one or more of the leading power distribution

providers or hardware vendors providing monitoring.

The critical sources of data that have the power circuits at their core still start typically as

Modbus registers. This is important because Modbus is still the preferred communications

protocol for many hardware vendors because of the low cost and low communications

overhead. However, this carries a price because this register-based protocol is very cryptic. It

has virtually none of the higher order information capability important to know, for example,

which three registers comprise the three circuits of a three phase connection to a rack, or which

individual circuit is now assigned to a specific customer. The manual intervention and

knowledge can be overwhelming.

As you move up the food chain, system level connectivity is frequently OPC (OLE for Process

Control), a higher order connection. SNMP, BACnet, or even another Modbus connection have

been used, but the lack of necessary higher order information remains.

The second critical step is the integration of the power data to the application or process used

for the rack asset management allocation. In so doing, changes in the asset management

system and changes in the power allocation and identification, whether for hardware

provisioning, customer energy billing, or customer dashboards are now possible.

This is realized,

-not by installing new hardware,

-not by installing new monitoring systems,

-by addressing the problem as an application, in effect a higher order solution that builds

on existing investments, and

-by recognizing that in most systems today finding a solution for this problem is not

obvious.


March 2014


The ability to manage this complexity in real time is the application that Power Analytics is

addressing The ability to integrate systems is the ability that Automsoft is addressing. The

combined solution represents a very specific and essential understanding of problem and the

proposed solution.

Paladin WSM by Power Analytics

In WSM, Power Analytics takes a very different approach from traditional Data Center

Infrastructure Management (DCIM). It engenders collaboration between Facilities and IT to

improve the management of Power, Space and Cooling, three areas that have historically been

difficult to optimize. WSM addresses these areas in its three major components: Remote Power

Panels, Rack View, and Heat Map.

THE WHITE SPACE

Remote Power Panels (RPP) Manager automates the creation and operation of power panels

for the data center.

RPP Manager links asset management systems and repositories for customer data, and

provides:

- A full 42 slot panel with branch circuit monitoring – automatic generation of

consolidated kW information for single, dual or three slot breakers, and validation

that the slots are available and contiguous. Breakers, slots and customer

identification can be easily changed as needed.


March 2014


- Grouping & Animation (G&A) – fully customizable alarm and notification settings

with the ability to “group” like categories. For example, G&A can show the

location of groups such as “lighting” or equipment that supports a specific

customer.

- Import/Export to Excel – the ability to import / export all information in the RPP

through Excel. This simply and directly automates the name change process.

EXAMPLE - RPP MANAGER VIEW

Rack View Manager shows the available spaces in the rack, what is installed, the power load

for the installed devices, the manufacturer’s specifications, and the actual power consumption

(with rack power monitoring).


March 2014


EXAMPLE - RACK MANAGER VIEW

Racks of all standard sizes are supported. The entire rack configuration can be imported /

exported via Excel to expedite provisioning and link to both asset management and power

management systems.


March 2014


Heat Map overlays a dynamic, animated heat map as a semi-transparent layer on any view of

the data center.

EXAMPLE - HEAT MAP MANGER VIEW

This provides the user with X / Y coordinates that correspond to the location of temperature

sensors in the White Space. The heat map shows temperature variation in the White Space,

and can be expanded to other locations in the facility where temperature sensors are installed.


March 2014


System Level Integration by Automsoft

Automsoft is one of the world’s leading providers of advanced data historian and process

optimization solutions that provide international customers with powerful and secure high-speed

data retrieval, vast storage capacity, complex analysis and sophisticated visualization.

Data historians are the ideal architecture for dealing with hundreds, thousands, and more time-

series data for regulatory, reporting and operations.

Combining the world class data management and integration of Automsoft’s RAPID™ solutions

platform with Power Analytics’ Paladin WSM provides the ability to integrate myriad existing data

sources and to scale up to virtually unlimited historized data sets with data resolution at and less

than one second.

AUTOMSOFT RAPID™ SYSTEM INTEGRATION WITH PALADIN WSM

Rather than the output of a low-level, register-based, static "snapshot" of the status of the

nominal values of the power parameters of a branch circuit from typical data center

infrastructure management tools, Paladin WSM integrated with Automsoft rapidHistorian™

delivers an information-rich, real time, dynamic, accurate view of the distribution of power in the

White Space - how much, to what equipment, and for whom. This is information which can

readily be used by Facilities and IT management to optimize the availability, capacity, and

efficiency of their data processing enterprise. White Space Management realized.


March 2014

http://www.automsoft.com/solutions/solutions

AUTOMSOFT and POWER ANALYTICS - Data Center White … 031714 for EI.pdf · AUTOMSOFT and POWER...

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