Case Study 1
Retrofits Lead to Significantly Increased HVAC Effectiveness
LBNL's benchmarking included two co-located data centers, one of which was the worst and the other the best in terms of the proportion of total electricity use devoted to HVAC [chart] (54% and 23%, respectively). The inefficient facility (Site 8.1) had the following attributes:
Facility 8.1
- Air cooled CRAC units
- No economizing
- Constant Speed Fans
- Humidification control
- All CRAC units on
Its efficient counterpart (Site 8.2) had the following attributes.
- Optimal central chilled water plant
- Optimal central air handling units
- Little humidity control
- Good control
- Data Monitoring – Gateways, EMCS
View end-use breakdowns [chart] for each site and the full report [download] on these sites.
Additional measures that could be applied to Site 8.2 to achieve even greater savings include:
Facility 8.2
- Site 8.1
- Disable humidification control
- Turn off CRAC units
- Shut off (rotate) surplus UPSs, i.e., go from N+2 to desired N+1
- Space temperature setpoints
- Site 8.2
- Monitoring - chiller, total chiller plant kW/Ton
- Run Cooling towers in parallel, nozzle replacement
- Chilled water setpoint
- Condenser water temperature reset
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