Watering the Data Center for a Greener Tomorrow

In 2012, IT planners find themselves in the grips of an “Infrastruggle” – a battle for storage strategy keyed to infrastructure and technology memes and bounded by economic forces. In this session, Jon Toigo, CEO of Toigo Partners International and Chairman of the Data Management Institute identifies the drivers of the infrastruggle and offers guidelines for building a business-savvy storage strategies that will provide a foundation for meeting present and future business data management requirements.

Toigo will survey six trends that threaten to increase storage cost and data risk, while reducing productivity at exactly the time when business managers are turning to IT to make fewer staff more productive. Then, he will survey effective short and longer term measures that can be taken to improve the efficiency of storage infrastructure in terms of its performance, capacity and data protection management.

With everyone talking about cloud storage, you would think it would be the end-all solution for many organizations wanting a better storage strategy for their infrastructure. However, is it a strategy you should be looking at? Join this panel of storage experts as they jump into the cloud to see when cloud storage is worth it and when it isn't.

This presentation will cover topics such as:
- the definition of cloud storage
- security and legal issues
- management problems by incorporating cloud into your storage strategy
- the future of cloud storage and new technologies

The availability of so many options and platforms for cloud migration seems daunting when you first start out. We started with the assumption that, at least for a smaller university, the economics of the cloud will lead to the end of life of our data center well before the end of this decade, but the benefits, costs, and opportunities for cloud migration are quite uneven and shifting rapidly. We'll share our journey and the criteria we use to decide what to move to the cloud (and where), and what to keep on premises - for now.

How is cloud computing increasing the pressure on traditional enterprise data centers, (both small and large) to react rapidly to the changing needs of the business and their customers? What new tools and working practices are emerging to enable technology professionals to create and deliver high quality services more quickly?

In this session, we’ll look at ways you can distill cloud computing down to principles that you can apply to how you manage your data center and deliver services and build the applications that support them. We’ll look at software-based networking as a case in point, and consider how cloud principles can support your devops and agile initiatives.

With funding decreasing every year for higher education, universities are turning to data centers to cut some of their operating expenses. Find out how Utah State University redesigned their data center with energy efficiency in mind to both lower the cost of running their infrastructure as well as understand their role in the environment.

This webinar will cover topics including:
- Understanding the fundamental problems with a data center redesign
- Developing a solution for hot isle, cold isle design
- The efficiency results from USU's redesign
- How the USU data center has impacted the educational environment

Host: Caroline Hitchins, datacentre.me

Moderator: Mark Acton, Uptime Institute

Andrew Snowsill, Ostler Consulting
Nick Vaney, Red
Shaun Smith, Sorrento Data Centres

Host: Caroline Hitchins, Datacentre.me

Moderator: Mark Acton, Uptime Institute

Alan Beresford, EcoCooling Ltd
Andy Hirst, Sudlows
Graeme Gordon, IFB

A data centre is a highly complex environment. More and more businesses are realising it is essential to have someone on their team who understands all aspects of this highly diverse and technical area. Data centres are also large energy users and are therefore under growing pressure to become as energy efficient as possible. This can only be achieved by a cohesive and comprehensive approach between the business, IT & Facilities. There are many new methodologies and technologies appearing to improve energy efficiency and businesses can easily make inappropriately matched choices and spend a fortune yet still not achieve their goals.

What is a CDCEP™?
A Certified Data Centre Energy Professional (CDCEP™) is an individual who can demonstrate knowledge in the different aspects required for planning and implementing data centre energy initiatives. Through comprehensive training, a CDCEP™ has been taught what it takes to achieve an ongoing and future-ready set of strategies for the data centre, no matter what the future may bring. These individuals are uniquely positioned to create the close linkage required between the data centre and the business in order to meet the business requirement.

The Role of the CDCEP™
The CDCEP™ programme has been created to provide individuals with the appropriate skills to enable them to develop into authorities in the development and implementation of long term data centre strategies to meet the business needs on a more efficient and sustainable basis. CDCEP™ is the first and still the only internationally recognised qualification in the data centre industry, recognised worldwide.

As DCiM becomes more pervasive in data centers their application and
uses are expanding -- opening the door to correlation of assets,
consumption and opportunities for improvement. This webinar will explore how these tools can go well beyond simple remediations, improving design, facilities and even IT operations as a whole.

Cloud computing seems like the perfect solution for creating an efficient and eco-friendly data center -- you, personally, have no physical data center to manage or bills to pay for the facility. However, is that necessarily true? Is cloud computing a process efficient and energy efficient investment for data centers? Join this panel as industry thought leaders discuss whether you can be efficient and energy-conscious by adopting cloud computing.

This panel will answer questions such as:
- How much more efficiency does the cloud provide than physical, on-premise data centers?
- How are you measuring efficiency after moving to a cloud provider?
- What benchmarking should you do internally before deciding what's efficient or greener?
- How will the transition from traditional data center to the cloud affect how the organization runs its business?

Is your storage infrastructure as energy efficient as it can be? Learn about common industry best practices and technologies such as thin provisioning, data deduplication, compression and storage-tiering to reduce energy consumption. Understand the SNIA Emerald Specification and Program for energy metrics when selecting new storage solutions.

The 451 Research, a division of The 451 Group, is an independent technology-industry analyst company focused on the Business of Enterprise IT Innovation. Our research makes sense of swiftly moving trends in the industry creating information technologies (IT) used by large and midsized organizations. We have offices in the US and Europe.

CNet is the world's leading provider of Data Centre training and the only source of Data Centre qualifications in the world today. Our Data Centre courses are the only means of acquiring independently awarded QUALIFICATIONS that are accredited by the largest number of independent organisations of any communications training provider; these include City & Guilds, BTEC (Edexcel), and BICSI. CNet also provides specialist training in IP & Communications with a full portfolio of technically based courses.

The Data Centre Alliance is a professional, not-for-profit association open to all Data Centre operators and Data Centre industry organisations to represent the data centre industry to the business world, academia, the media, governments and the general public.

This presentation shall explain the implementation of fresh air direct evaporative cooling systems in larger data centres. These systems can reduce conventional cooling costs and energy use by over 90% and can enable data centres to achieve a PUE of 1.1 or under. Design examples shall include retro-fit and new installations up to 5MW. The experience gained by installing the EcoCooling Computer Room Evaporative Coolers (CRECs) in over 90 data centres and server rooms in the UK shall be shared to help viewers understand in detail the factors to be taken into consideration when considering this technology.

Without changing the way you manage the data centre, you won’t get the benefit of DCIM toolsets. So which comes first? tools, process changes or the people changes? This talk covers the issues that affect the efficient running of data centres beyond DCIM toolsets.

Presentation Aims:

- To raise awareness among managers, owners, investors, with targeted information and material on the opportunity to improve efficiency.

- To provide an open process and forum for discussion representing European stakeholder requirements.

- To create and provide an enabling tool for industry to implement cost-effective energy saving opportunities

- To develop a set of easily understood metrics to measure the current efficiencies and improvement.

- To produce a common set of principles in harmonisation with other international initiatives.

- To support procurement, by providing criteria for equipment (based on the Energy Star Programme specifications, when available, and other Codes of Conducts), and best practice recommendation for complex systems.

Can Utility Funding Drive Data Center Energy Efficiency Programs? What is the best way to align Owner/Operator Efforts with these Programs? The Green Data Center Alliance is working with NYSERDA and It’s End User Membership to address these questions and implement a program that hopes to marry the mutual goal of both industries – Energy Reduction in Data Centers.

Chris Stump, Project Manager with NYSERDA will cover existing programs relevant to the data center, funds available, and how the GDCA effort fits within their overall program.

Derek Schwartz, Executive Director from GDCA will discuss the mission of the group, its roots and why the NYSERDA program is important for the industry.

Daniel Skutelsky, Director Certification & Compliance from GDCA will discuss the creation of the framework, status update on progress, describe the Pilot program and provide feedback from participants and how the program is evolving.