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Michael McPhee, Dip Mech Eng, MIE Aust, Chartered Professional Engineer, MAIRAH MASHRAE Associate Director, Umow Lai Pty Ltd Michael has specialist expertise in Data Centre Upgrades having completed a number of major projects for financial institutions and telecommunication service providers in recent years. Brian Lacey, Dip Mech Eng, MIE Aust, Chartered Engineer Senior Mechanical Engineer, A.G. Coombs Pty Ltd Brian has been involved in a number of data centre upgrades as well as the installation of a number of cogeneration systems including both micro-turbine and lean gas engines for commercial, data centre and industrial projects.
Abstract
With data centre sector carbon emissions expected to exceed those of the airline industry by 2020 and rapidly increasing energy costs, the use of Tri-Generation systems is seen as a key strategy available to Australias Data Centre owners and managers to mitigate these risks Requiring significant capital investment, large Tri-Generation systems can provide high payoffs in terms of carbon emission and energy cost reductions. Whilst tri-Generation systems are being considered for new data centre facilities, retrofitting and commissioning of large Tri-Generation systems is considered to be particularly challenging within a live data centre environment. NAB are making a significant commitment to the environment through their Carbon Neutral 2010 Program, with carbon emissions associated with their Data Centres targeted for particular attention. In 2010 they completed the installation of a 2000kW Tri-Generation system at their primary data centre facility with the joint aims of reducing the Data Centres carbon emissions by some 20,000 tonnes of CO2 per annum as well as providing a positive financial return. It should be noted that the installation of the Tri-Generation plant in the Data Centre was an NAB initiative. The initiative was supported by Banks Facility Managers, United Group Services, who provided significant input and cooperation during the design and construction phases of the project. The project presented many engineering, installation and commissioning challenges whilst assuring the overriding requirement that the data centres service availability and system reliability were not compromised through the project delivery. Now that the plant is up and running, Brian and Michael present some of the key lessons learnt through the project implementation from the design phase through to final client handover, as well as review the performance of the system to date.
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In recent years there has been a number of initiatives developed to reduce the power and cooling demands. These initiatives include Hot/Cold Aisle Configuration Hot Aisle Containment Air / Water Side Economy Cycles Kyoto Cooling Chilled water supply temperature Raised Internal Design Conditions (Refer 2008 ASHRAE Environmental Guidelines for Datacom Equipment Expanding the Recommended Environmental Envelope) Supplementary cooling, in-rack / in-row cooling Tri-Generation
Fig 3 - Exhaust gas 2 Stage Absorption Chiller fitted with Gas Burner (Photo courtesy of Broad)
Fig 4 Natural Gas fired Spark Ignition Reciprocating Gas Engine and Alternator (Photo courtesy of Cummins Engines)
Data Centres usually have a constant power demand for the IT equipment. The power to IT equipment is converted to heat in the Data room, so unless there is an economy cycle in operation, the constant power demand results in a constant cooling load. This is an ideal application for Tri-Generation, as a plant selection can be matched to meet the power load and cooling load. Below are examples of the load profiles for a Data Centre project.
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Also below is a graph showing the break up of the maximum demand load
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From the above graphs it can be seen that the load for a Data Centre is reasonable constant over one years operation. This is a quite different load profile from other types of commercial buildings, where there is a high cooling load in summer and low load in winter. This load profile allows a Tri-Generation plant to be selected, which can match the power and cooling load and result in a fully loaded gas engine and absorption chiller.
Option 4 was selected for the project for a number of reasons including the shortest overall pay back period. However, one of the main advantages of Option 4 was that the on gas engine failure, the grid seamlessly took the site load with no interruption to power to the site. The Tri-Generation system adopted for the project therefore stands alone on the side providing power to the Data Centre. The Grid supply and standby generator supply are still fully operational so the Tri-Generation does not reduce the electrical supply reliability. If one of the other options had been adopted, as the TriGeneration was operating in island mode from the grid supply, there would have been a break in the power supply to the data centre on gas engine failure, which would have required the UPS to maintain the site load until the grid supply could be restored or alternatively a type of bumpless transfer would be required. So the lesson learnt here is that, for a Data Centre application, the Tri-Generation plant should be connected embedded with the grid to ensure there is no unreliability added to the power supply system. There are some other risks that need to be considered that may arise from the installation of the new TriGeneration plant. These include fire and explosion risk of introducing a gas engine into the Data Centre. These risks need to be addressed and risk mitigation strategies developed.
utilised in the absorption chiller. Cooling towers for absorption chillers are 2 to 2.5 times larger than cooling towers required for conventional electric chillers of similar capacity. For our project the absorption chillers did not provide sufficient cooling capacity on their own to handle the site load and needed to be supplemented by the site electric chillers. Chiller controls need to be arranged so the absorption chiller acts as a base load chiller and the electric chiller tops up the load. If the controls are arranged so the electric and absorption chillers share the load, then the absorption chiller may not operate in a fully loaded condition. This would result in the waste heat not being fully utilised.
specialist expertise in this area was engaged to carry out this analysis. The analysis was needed to be done and submitted to the Utility prior to approval being received. In addition the electricity authority costs, which are significant need to be included in the project budget. Consideration to completing the contract documentation between the electric utility and the client early in the design phase may minimise the possibility of delays in the delivery of the project. Gas Supply Utility Approval must be obtained for the gas supply company to connect a gas engine to the site gas supply. As gas engines can operate 24 hours a day, the normal reserves in the gas supply street reticulation are not available to supply the gas engines. On our project, reinforcement was required to the gas supply mains in order to supply the new plant with significant associated costs. It should be noted that the gas companies are encouraging the installation of Tri-Generation plant as there is an increase in the gas usage.
systems should be provided with independent controls leaving the PLC system to carry out the critical functions alone. The Generator Set on board controls may have the ability to carry synchronising functions and perhaps reverse power protection. This control system would typically be a programmable electronic type, often a PLC type and will typically control many internal generator functions such as engine starting, speed/output frequency, power management, and engine safeties & fault alarms etc. Due to the complexity of these issues and the likelihood that they will need adjustment and even upgrading of their software during commissioning and throughout the life of the installation, the critical functions described above should be independently managed (by a PLC system as described above). The Absorption Chiller on board controls will probably have the ability to control the stop/start and speed control functions of the chilled and condenser water pumps. Whilst the chiller does need control of certain pump functions, or at least input of pump status, there are some external issues involved: The chillers control system will not inherently accommodate the engine cooling system need for the condenser water system pump(s) to run, and the chilled water pump operation needs to be controlled in concert with the main chilled water pump system to ensure that no undesirable effects are imposed onto the main chilled water system. These pumps should be controlled by the facility BMS/DDC system, with pump status signals output to the chiller control. The buildings BMS/DDC system will control all of the systems external to the TriGeneration plant. Given the generalist nature of these controls, the broad extent of the system and the likelihood that technicians who are not familiar with the TriGeneration plant will need to access the BMS/DDC system our general opinion is that BMS/DDC ought to be only used for less critical functions where direct interface needs exist. The generator sets gas train controls are a critical sub-system. Due to the variation in gas types and gas safety regulations around the world (noting that the gas engine generator sets are a global product range for all genset suppliers) the gas train controls are usually not fully integrated into the genset and an external control system is provided. If the building is provided with an independent chiller control system for the optimisation of the chiller system functions, this system should sequence the chillers according to the availability of the absorption chiller. The absorption chiller would normally be used to its maximum, to gain the best utilisation from the TriGeneration system overall. The BMS/DDC would monitor this system and control the associated systems (such as cooling towers, pumps etc).
Figure 1
Whilst it is perhaps a statement of the obvious, as much pre-commissioning as possible should be carried out. Off-site demonstrations of soft-ware should be carried out. These demonstrations should be presented by the technicians who will eventually carry out the work to avoid miscommunications interrupting the process when it reaches site and time becomes critical.
One specific issue of noteworthiness: All connections to the engine, whether they are piped services or electrical cables, should have ample accommodation for vibration. Pipework connections in particular should have anti-vibration connections of generous length a length of more than our times the diameter would a be sensible minimum to adopt as a rule of thumb. Pipework connections must be aligned with the crankshaft orientation (ie horizontal and lengthwise along the engine) to accommodate the vertical vibration in operation and the rotational torque reaction movement under starting/stopping and sudden load changes.
4. Acknowledgements
The Client and Project Partners are warmly acknowledged for their input into this paper and permission to use their project as a case study: National Australia Bank, Mr Gary OConnor, Manager Facilities & Workplace, Commercial Services United Group Limited, Mr Alan Sloane and Mr David Brooke, Facilities Managers