Tropical Data Centre (DC) Standard

The Government Technology Agency of Singapore (GovTech) is driving sustainability in the digital sector by implementing the Tropical DC Standard across its central Government Data Centres (GDCs).

Scope and Implementation

GovTech took a systematic and data-driven approach for selected GDC data halls:

• Baseline setting: Assessed cooling system performance at 24°C supply air temperature to IT equipment.
• Action taken: Gradually increased supply air temperature from 24°C to 26°C over a period of 2 months.
• Continuous monitoring: Used real-time sensors installed at racks to monitor and track environmental metrics.

All adjustments followed industry best practices such as ASHRAE TC9.9 guidelines and equipment tolerance standards. Special attention was given to IT equipment diversity and sensitivity.

Challenges and Solutions

To ensure that optimisation was safe and disruption-free, GovTech implemented several safeguards:

• Comprehensive risk assessment and audits to identify and mitigate potential adverse impacts before implementation. This entailed careful monitoring of airflow and temperature, reducing the risk of heat spikes and development of local hotspots that can potentially damage IT equipment.
• Pre-alert thresholds were set to detect abnormal temperature increases across the installed IT equipment.
• Close coordination between GDC facilities and Agency IT teams ensured swift incident response.

Measured Impact

Early results demonstrate the success of GovTech’s strategy:

• Cooling load reductions have delivered up to 40% energy savings on cooling fans used within the data hall (i.e. computer room air handlers).
• Annual cost savings are estimated at 15%.
• No adverse impact observed on IT system performance, hardware longevity, or uptime.

Future Initiatives

Building on the success of this initiative, GovTech is planning several new DC sustainability initiatives:

• Consolidating IT workloads from three legacy DCs into a next-generation Government DC to enhance energy efficiency.
• Exploring advanced cooling technologies such as Fan-Wall system to achieve further energy reductions.
• Pursuing Green Mark for Data Centres 2024 certification to benchmark and further improve environmental performance.

BDx successfully applied the Tropical DC Standard in their retail co-location facility by effectively managing change while serving a diverse customer base.

Scope and Implementation

A key element of BDx’s approach was customer collaboration. BDx developed a comprehensive engagement strategy with selected customers, partnering them through:

• Regular sharing of monitoring data and performance metrics.
• Ensuring Service Level Agreements (SLAs) were consistently met during temperature adjustments.

The extensive engagement helped to maintain customer confidence and encouraged more customers to participate, while enhancing cooling efficiency across participating data halls.

Challenges and Solutions

Before making any temperature changes, BDx:

• Conducted risk assessments and equipment evaluations to ensure equipment can operate safely at the higher temperature.
• Implemented redundant cooling measures to prevent temperature fluctuations.
• Deployed a real-time monitoring system for granular performance tracking.
• Applied AI- drive predictive analytics to support real-time adjustments and maintain optimal performance throughout the transition.

Measured Impact

BDx achieved a 7% reduction in cooling energy consumption, demonstrating tangible results from their optimisation efforts.

Digital Realty successfully implemented the Tropical DC Standard for large-scale temperature and humidity optimisation in a wholesale co-location DC.

Scope and Implementation

Digital Realty conducted a large-scale trial across two 4.5 MW data halls to achieve energy savings while maintaining operational reliability.

The implementation approach covered:

• Establishing baseline of existing environmental conditions in the data halls.
• Systematic temperature adjustment, including:
  ▪ Increasing Computer Room Air Handler (CRAH) supply air temperature from 23°C to a higher temperature – delivering higher air temperature to the IT equipment.
  ▪ Adjusting Precision Air Unit (PAU) relative humidity setpoint from 11.2°C to a higher temperature – allowing for higher relative humidity levels within the data halls.
• Continuous environmental monitoring

Challenges and Solutions

Digital Realty adopted a comprehensive monitoring and adjustment strategy to manage temperatures, including:

• Regular hotspot identification and immediate remediation of thermal irregularities across the IT equipment in the data halls.
• Closely monitoring external climate factors, recognising that Singapore’s tropical climate conditions required careful balancing of internal parameters.

Measured Impact

These coordinated changes delivered a 2-3% reduction in total energy usage across the trial data halls.

Ready Server showed the strong potential for energy efficiency gains in cloud computing environments, by using the Tropical DC Standard to optimise temperature management in cloud infrastructure.

Scope and Implementation

Ready Server used the three-phase Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) framework outlined in the Tropical DC Standard:

• Measurement and Simulation
  ▪ Used vendor tools to analyse energy profiles under varied operating conditions and leveraged simulation models to augment actual performance data.
• Detailed TCO calculations
  ▪ Incorporated contributing factors such as energy costs, maintenance, equipment lifecycle impacts, and failure rates at different temperature settings.
  ▪ Identified an optimal operating temperature of 29°C that balances energy efficiency and IT equipment reliability.
• Operational Classification and Optimisation
  ▪ Grouped evaluated temperature and humidity setpoints into four distinct operating levels, each with its own cost-benefit profile.
  ▪ Enabled informed decision making based on actual workload requirements and environmental conditions.

Measured Impact

Ready Server reduced TCO by 8% by operating 160kW DC capacity at 29°C supply air temperature instead of at 24°C.