MechChem Africa August 2019

⎪ Heating, cooling, ventilation and air conditioning ⎪

Data centres can be efficient and green

tre could also dramatically increase cooling efficiencies. “I think renewable energy in data centres can also reduce power usage as innovation and technologies continue to evolve in the energy storage sector,” says de Leeuw. “I do not doubt that we will soon get to a stage where the initial capital expenditure for the installation and use of solar technologies and their associated rate-of-return expectations will be within reach of many customers. “This will make the use of solar energy widely accessible in regions of the world where there is plenty of sunshine available,” de Leeuw says. “Another viable possibility will be to use solar energy to chill water into ice during the day via an absorption type refrigeration system, which could then be used to cool the datacentreduringtheevening,”hepredicts. q

Schneider Electric, a global specialist in energy management and automation, makes efficiency a top priority in data centre design owing to environmental and cost concerns.

T he need for data centres to continue togrowplacesatremendousamount of pressure on electrical power util- ityproviders. Ina typical data centre, whichrequiresvastamountsofclean,uninter- ruptible power, power usage can range froma few kilowatts to tens of megawatts. This is power that is free from all spikes, dips, sags or similar power disturbances. The power also has to come from a steady source that is not interrupted in any way. “The electrical power is used to feedactive information technology (IT) equipment. This includes computer servers, network switches, network routers, storage servers and similar pieces of active equipment. A portion of the power supplied to the data centre then gets directed to auxiliary equipment such as computer-room air conditioners that will help dissipate the heat generated by all ac- tive data centre equipment and also control relative humidity,” explains Riaan de Leeuw, VP of Schneider Electric’s IT division in the Anglophone Africa region. Ideally, the bulk of this power should go to the active equipment and very little or none to the non-active equipment in the data cen- tre. Usually, the percentage that goes to the active equipment is about 50%, with about 35% of the total power supplied going to the cooling apparatus, and the remainder toother services such as lighting, fire detection and suppression, access control andother smaller power consumers.

“Unfortunately, this is not always the case, especiallywhen looking at older data centres that still employ traditional methods of cool- ing,” he says. Because data centre cooling takes the sec- ondmost amount of power, it makes sense to focus efforts on reducing power consumption by making the cooling work more efficiently. One option would be to design and use best-fit coolingmethodology fromtheground up. Or, in the case of an existing data centre, retrofitting certain aspects of the data cen-

An illustration of a typical Schneider Electric data centre cooling module.

The SADC Combustion Seminar The Southern African Gas Association (SAGA)willbehostingtheSADCCombustion Seminar, which will address a variety of technical aspects of combustion and fuel handling systems. This two-day seminarwill be heldon the9 and10October 2019 at the CSIR International ConventionCentre. The seminar will cover a wide range of combus- tion themed discussions and talks, ranging fromFuelManagement, EnergyEfficiencies, future CNG & LNG Applications, Burner ManagementSystemsandProcessControls, amongst others.

ers on the following topics: • Biogas applications case studies (domestic/commercial/industrial). • Boiler combustion efficiencies. • HFO/LFO alternative fuels for combus- tion systems. • Piping and burner sizing. • Emissions reductions & testing on all types of combustion equipment. • Cyber security and the potential impact on gas operations. • CNG/LNG applications now and the future. The complexity of the combustion process requires great skills and knowledge, this un- derlying factor will be discussed in detail at the SADCCombustion seminar. To view the preliminaryprogrammeand the registration form visit: www.sagas.co.za

secured17 exhibition spotswithin a private and secludedexhibition spacewhere all tea/ coffee breaks will be served allowing for great networking opportunities. Attendees can expect hard-hitting talks and case studies that will be looking for answers to the toughest questions and solu- tions to the biggest combustion challenges. The event is set to be one of the continent’s premier gatherings of theenergy consuming industries as it will be attended by key play- ers fromSADCand other African countries. Those interested inexhibitingneed to in- form SAGA as to exhibition space required, whichwill be allocatedon a first-come-first- serve basis. SAGA is also calling for potential speak-

Interested parties are invited to share in this exciting partnership as a delegate and/ or exhibitor, which will be a unique oppor- tunity to participate in the event. SAGA has

August 2019 • MechChem Africa ¦ 27