WP#76 - Power Metrics for ITE

Overview

WP#76 is a white paper from The Green Grid dated 21 December 2017, under work item WI #17-002. Its subject is defining metrics for the power demand and energy consumption of IT equipment (ITE) platforms. ITE systems cover compute, storage and network hardware. The full text requires signing in with a free The Green Grid account; the information in this record comes from the summary on the library's public landing page.

The paper aligns with the tuples defined in WP#72 for ICT capacity and utilization. It contains two central concepts: ITE power utilization and ITE energy. ITE power utilization shows how much of the capacity is used, while ITE energy typically expresses annual consumption. One therefore measures the relation between instantaneous load and capacity, and the other measures total consumption over a period.

Multi-year trends inform future capital (capex) and operating (opex) expenditure. This is the basis of the paper's practical value: tracking the metrics over time moves capacity planning from assumption to data. The design implication in the record suggests tracking actual versus provisioned power per rack and per hall, and using the trend to forecast when UPS and cooling capacity will be exhausted.

Formula details, measurement points and example values are not part of the public summary; for these the paper itself and WP#72 should be consulted. The paper dates from 2017, and the extent to which the metrics were adopted later cannot be judged from this record. It still offers a valid conceptual framework for capacity tracking and planning.

Key points

1. Dated 21 December 2017; work item WI #17-002.
2. ITE systems: compute, storage and network hardware.
3. Aligns with WP#72 tuples for ICT capacity and utilization.
4. ITE power utilization and ITE energy (typically annual) are defined.
5. ITE power utilization shows how much capacity is used; ITE energy shows annual consumption.
6. Multi-year trends inform future capex and opex.

Using it in design

• In capacity planning, track ITE power utilisation (actual versus provisioned) per rack and hall.
• Use the trend to forecast when UPS and cooling capacity will be exhausted.
• Add annual ITE energy as an input to capex and opex forecasts.
• Verify the metric definitions from the paper and WP#72 before implementing them.

Who should read it

Capacity planners, operations engineers and data centre managers tracking IT and facility power demand.

Publication details

Authors

Phil Isaak; Robert Bunger; Jay Dietrich; Donald Goddard; James Halpin; Robert Landstrom

Publisher

The Green Grid

Year

2017

Document number

WP 76

Document language

English

Source type

Industry body

Access

Citation only

Licence

Copyright retained; citation only — the publisher’s terms apply to the original document

Citation