The Computational Research and Theory Facility: Pushing the Envelope of Data Center Energy Efficiency

Steve Greenberg, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
Amit Khanna, Arup

Currently in design, the Computational Research and Theory Facility (CRTF) is scheduled to be operational in 2012. The building will be owned by the University of California and will house the National Energy Research Supercomputing Center (NERSC) of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. NERSC operates some of the world's most powerful unclassified supercomputers and hosts users from around the world working on problems like climate modeling that require high performance scientific computer systems.

With a construction budget of $90 million, the CRTF will be a building of 140,000 gross square feet, including 32,000 assignable square feet of high-performance computer center floor, plus offices and support areas. The initial electrical power requirement will be 7.5 megawatts (MW), expandable to 17MW. Approximately 300 staff will occupy the center and associated office space.

The CRTF has a goal of a minimum Data Center Infrastructure Efficiency (DCIE) of 0.83, which would be better than any data center benchmarked to date. In addition to achieving this energy performance, the building must maintain the flexibility needed to house numerous generations of supercomputing systems over the next few decades that have unknown power and cooling needs. It is intended to take full advantage of the information technology (IT) equipment manufacturers' temperature and humidity limits, as well as Berkeley's mild climate and minimal requirements for Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) backup. The facility is planning to include:

• Air-side economizer
• Water-side economizer, possibly with two-stage cooling towers
• Low pressure-drop air-side design
• Isolation of cold and/or hot air flows on the equipment floor
• Dividable above and under-floor space to allow different environmental
  conditions for different computing systems
• Direct evaporative cooling for humidification
• Two-temperature cooling water distribution
• Heat recovery to heat office areas within the building as well as nearby
  laboratory buildings
• Low-loss electrical distribution, including 480VAC distribution to racks and
  flywheel-based UPS systems
• Modularity of the air and water-based systems to ensure maximum
  flexibility in the future while controlling first costs

The features and details will evolve as the design progresses; the presentation will be on the most current design at the time.

Biographies:

Steve Greenberg is an energy management engineer at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He has been working in the area of energy efficiency in buildings for 28 years and data centers for over 10. A member of both LBNL's high-tech buildings research team and its facilities group, he has worked on studying and applying energy efficiency in a wide range of server rooms from 20 kW to 16MW of IT load.

Amit Khanna is a mechanical consultant with Arup—a global consulting
engineering firm with over 10,000 professionals in 92 offices. Amit specializes in sustainable design, assessment, and consultation, and has worked on a broad range of national and international projects. His expertise lies in climate responsive building engineering and LEED®/Labs21 consulting to create an energy efficient and healthier built environment both in and outdoors.

Back to Agenda