IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/appene/v276y2020ics0306261920310096.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A new indicator for a fair comparison on the energy performance of data centers

Author

Listed:
  • Li, Jian
  • Jurasz, Jakub
  • Li, Hailong
  • Tao, Wen-Quan
  • Duan, Yuanyuan
  • Yan, Jinyue

Abstract

The power usage effectiveness (PUE) is commonly used as the key performance indicator to evaluate the energy performance of data centers. However, using only PUE cannot enable a fair comparison when data centers are operating in different regions, due to the unneglectable impacts of climatic conditions on the power consumption of cooling systems. To solve this problem, a new indicator, coefficient of PUE (COPUE), is proposed, which is defined as the ratio of the measured PUE of real data centers to the local benchmark PUE. The benchmark PUE is reckoned based on the current most commonly used cooling technology, which consists of water-cooled chillers and water cooling towers. A simplified method for calculating benchmark PUE is also developed. The degree hour of water cooling is introduced to consider the impacts of local climatic conditions. It presents the annual accumulated hours, in which chilled water is needed to satisfy the cooling demand of data centers. Through several case studies, COPUE has been proved to be an effective indicator for comparing the energy performance of data centers. When the same cooling technology is adopted, it can reflect how good the design and operation are; while, when different cooling technologies are adopted, it can be used to demonstrate which one is superior.

Suggested Citation

  • Li, Jian & Jurasz, Jakub & Li, Hailong & Tao, Wen-Quan & Duan, Yuanyuan & Yan, Jinyue, 2020. "A new indicator for a fair comparison on the energy performance of data centers," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 276(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:276:y:2020:i:c:s0306261920310096
    DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2020.115497
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306261920310096
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.apenergy.2020.115497?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ebrahimi, Khosrow & Jones, Gerard F. & Fleischer, Amy S., 2014. "A review of data center cooling technology, operating conditions and the corresponding low-grade waste heat recovery opportunities," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 622-638.
    2. Garimella, Suresh V. & Persoons, Tim & Weibel, Justin & Yeh, Lian-Tuu, 2013. "Technological drivers in data centers and telecom systems: Multiscale thermal, electrical, and energy management," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 66-80.
    3. Nicola Jones, 2018. "How to stop data centres from gobbling up the world’s electricity," Nature, Nature, vol. 561(7722), pages 163-166, September.
    4. Huang, Pei & Copertaro, Benedetta & Zhang, Xingxing & Shen, Jingchun & Löfgren, Isabelle & Rönnelid, Mats & Fahlen, Jan & Andersson, Dan & Svanfeldt, Mikael, 2020. "A review of data centers as prosumers in district energy systems: Renewable energy integration and waste heat reuse for district heating," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 258(C).
    5. Cho, Jinkyun & Kim, Yundeok, 2016. "Improving energy efficiency of dedicated cooling system and its contribution towards meeting an energy-optimized data center," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 967-982.
    6. Habibi Khalaj, Ali & Halgamuge, Saman K., 2017. "A Review on efficient thermal management of air- and liquid-cooled data centers: From chip to the cooling system," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 205(C), pages 1165-1188.
    7. Siriwardana, Jayantha & Jayasekara, Saliya & Halgamuge, Saman K., 2013. "Potential of air-side economizers for data center cooling: A case study for key Australian cities," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 207-219.
    8. Depoorter, Victor & Oró, Eduard & Salom, Jaume, 2015. "The location as an energy efficiency and renewable energy supply measure for data centres in Europe," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 140(C), pages 338-349.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chen, Sirui & Li, Peng & Ji, Haoran & Yu, Hao & Yan, Jinyue & Wu, Jianzhong & Wang, Chengshan, 2021. "Operational flexibility of active distribution networks with the potential from data centers," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 293(C).
    2. Qiankun Chang & Yuanfeng Huang & Kaiyan Liu & Xin Xu & Yaohua Zhao & Song Pan, 2024. "Optimization Control Strategies and Evaluation Metrics of Cooling Systems in Data Centers: A Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(16), pages 1-41, August.
    3. Fan, Chengliang & Hinkelman, Kathryn & Fu, Yangyang & Zuo, Wangda & Huang, Sen & Shi, Chengnan & Mamaghani, Nasim & Faulkner, Cary & Zhou, Xiaoqing, 2021. "Open-source Modelica models for the control performance simulation of chiller plants with water-side economizer," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 299(C).
    4. Khaled Iyad Alsharif & Aspen Glaspell & Kyosung Choo, 2021. "Energy Conservation Measures for a Research Data Center in an Academic Campus," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(10), pages 1-12, May.
    5. Mateusz Borkowski & Adam Krzysztof Piłat, 2022. "Energy Efficiency Increase Achieved by Dedicated Rule-Based Control of Chillers Operating in the Data Center," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(7), pages 1-25, March.
    6. Li, Weiwei & Qian, Tong & Zhang, Yin & Shen, Yueqing & Wu, Chenghu & Tang, Wenhu, 2023. "Distributionally robust chance-constrained planning for regional integrated electricity–heat systems with data centers considering wind power uncertainty," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 336(C).
    7. Han, Ouzhu & Ding, Tao & Mu, Chenggang & Jia, Wenhao & Ma, Zhoujun, 2023. "Waste heat reutilization and integrated demand response for decentralized optimization of data centers," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 264(C).
    8. Lin, Xiaojie & Lin, Xueru & Zhong, Wei & Zhou, Yi, 2024. "Multi-time scale dynamic operation optimization method for industrial park electricity-heat-gas integrated energy system considering demand elasticity," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 293(C).
    9. Ji, Haoran & Chen, Sirui & Yu, Hao & Li, Peng & Yan, Jinyue & Song, Jieying & Wang, Chengshan, 2022. "Robust operation for minimizing power consumption of data centers with flexible substation integration," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 248(C).
    10. Ye, Guisen & Gao, Feng & Fang, Jingyang, 2022. "A mission-driven two-step virtual machine commitment for energy saving of modern data centers through UPS and server coordinated optimizations," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 322(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Chu, Wen-Xiao & Wang, Chi-Chuan, 2019. "A review on airflow management in data centers," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 240(C), pages 84-119.
    2. Heran Jing & Zhenhua Quan & Yaohua Zhao & Lincheng Wang & Ruyang Ren & Ruixue Dong & Yuting Wu, 2022. "Experimental Investigation of Heat Transfer and Flow Characteristics of Split Natural Cooling System for Data Center Based on Micro Heat Pipe Array," Energies, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-22, June.
    3. Habibi Khalaj, Ali & Scherer, Thomas & K. Halgamuge, Saman, 2016. "Energy, environmental and economical saving potential of data centers with various economizers across Australia," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 183(C), pages 1528-1549.
    4. Cheng Liu & Hang Yu, 2021. "Evaluation and Optimization of a Two-Phase Liquid-Immersion Cooling System for Data Centers," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(5), pages 1-21, March.
    5. Jerez Monsalves, Juan & Bergaentzlé, Claire & Keles, Dogan, 2023. "Impacts of flexible-cooling and waste-heat recovery from data centres on energy systems: A Danish case study," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 281(C).
    6. Cristina Ramos Cáceres & Suzanna Törnroth & Mattias Vesterlund & Andreas Johansson & Marcus Sandberg, 2022. "Data-Center Farming: Exploring the Potential of Industrial Symbiosis in a Subarctic Region," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(5), pages 1-23, February.
    7. Hyvönen, Johannes & Mori, Taro & Saunavaara, Juha & Hiltunen, Pauli & Pärssinen, Matti & Syri, Sanna, 2024. "Potential of solar photovoltaics and waste heat utilization in cold climate data centers. Case study: Finland and northern Japan," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 201(C).
    8. Cho, Jinkyun & Kim, Yundeok, 2016. "Improving energy efficiency of dedicated cooling system and its contribution towards meeting an energy-optimized data center," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 967-982.
    9. Isazadeh, Amin & Ziviani, Davide & Claridge, David E., 2023. "Global trends, performance metrics, and energy reduction measures in datacom facilities," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 174(C).
    10. Vesterlund, Mattias & Borisová, Stanislava & Emilsson, Ellinor, 2024. "Data center excess heat for mealworm farming, an applied analysis for sustainable protein production," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 353(PA).
    11. Sijun Xu & Hua Zhang & Zilong Wang, 2023. "Thermal Management and Energy Consumption in Air, Liquid, and Free Cooling Systems for Data Centers: A Review," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(3), pages 1-25, January.
    12. Tian, Tong & Wang, Xinyue & Liu, Yang & Yang, Xuan & Sun, Bo & Li, Ji, 2023. "Nano-engineering enabled heat pipe battery: A powerful heat transfer infrastructure with capability of power generation," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 348(C).
    13. Huang, Pei & Copertaro, Benedetta & Zhang, Xingxing & Shen, Jingchun & Löfgren, Isabelle & Rönnelid, Mats & Fahlen, Jan & Andersson, Dan & Svanfeldt, Mikael, 2020. "A review of data centers as prosumers in district energy systems: Renewable energy integration and waste heat reuse for district heating," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 258(C).
    14. Silva, C.A. & Vilaça, R. & Pereira, A. & Bessa, R.J., 2024. "A review on the decarbonization of high-performance computing centers," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 189(PB).
    15. Matteo Manganelli & Alessandro Soldati & Luigi Martirano & Seeram Ramakrishna, 2021. "Strategies for Improving the Sustainability of Data Centers via Energy Mix, Energy Conservation, and Circular Energy," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(11), pages 1-25, May.
    16. Zhang, Hainan & Shao, Shuangquan & Tian, Changqing & Zhang, Kunzhu, 2018. "A review on thermosyphon and its integrated system with vapor compression for free cooling of data centers," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 81(P1), pages 789-798.
    17. Wang, Fengjuan & Lv, Chengwei & Xu, Jiuping, 2023. "Carbon awareness oriented data center location and configuration: An integrated optimization method," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 278(C).
    18. Ham, Sang-Woo & Kim, Min-Hwi & Choi, Byung-Nam & Jeong, Jae-Weon, 2015. "Energy saving potential of various air-side economizers in a modular data center," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 138(C), pages 258-275.
    19. Zhang, Hainan & Shao, Shuangquan & Xu, Hongbo & Zou, Huiming & Tang, Mingsheng & Tian, Changqing, 2017. "Simulation on the performance and free cooling potential of the thermosyphon mode in an integrated system of mechanical refrigeration and thermosyphon," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 185(P2), pages 1604-1612.
    20. Borkowski, Mateusz & Piłat, Adam Krzysztof, 2022. "Customized data center cooling system operating at significant outdoor temperature fluctuations," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 306(PB).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:appene:v:276:y:2020:i:c:s0306261920310096. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/405891/description#description .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.