ITO America Panel Discussion: Issues in the Data Center

Power and cooling issues in the data center continue to be at the forefront of concerns for IT and data center management teams.

William Dibella, President of AFCOM, the premier industry group for data center professionals, puts forward a series of thought provoking questions to Doug Balog, Chairman of Blade.org and Vice President of IBM Bladecenter; and Sriram Ramakrishnan, Board Member Blade Systems Alliance and the Powerware business unit head for Eaton Corporation.

Sriram Ramakrishnan is the Business Unit Manager for Powerware Data Center Solutions with Eaton. He has worked in various business development, marketing and engineering capacities over the last 12 years within the power quality and mission-critical environment of GE and Eaton. He is also a member of Blade.org and the Blade Systems Alliance
Doug Balog is Vice President, IBM Modular and Blade Systems Development and also serves as Chairperson of the industry Blade Server solution community.

Prior to this Mr. Balog was Vice President and Business Line Executive for BladeCenter. Mr. Balog has also served as Technical Executive on IBM's integrated account team for Charles Schwab Corporation from January 2001 to April 2002

Sriram Ramakrishnan: There are two key aspects to increasing efficiency while reducing power consumption and cost. First, you must have reliable and meaningful; data about present-day power consumption and quality: not just a snapshot, but a performance record. Second, you need the ability to analyze, troubleshoot and assess trends over time.

Doug Balog: Data center managers should make a plan. Start with assumptions if necessary. Some data center managers have already reported that the cost of electricity and cooling in the data center are exceeding the cost of equipment itself.

Sriram Ramakrishnan: As much as 30 to 60 percent of data center utility bill goes to support cooling systems. If that figure seems to high, it is. As data center managers struggle to reduce this burden, they have to weigh several variables.

Doug Balog: I think liquid cooling is an incredibly effective solution for addressing heat issues in the data center.