The 7x24 New England Chapter meets at Milton CAT to discuss best practices in data center design.

The fall 2009 New England Area chapter meeting of 7x24 Exchange International was carefully planned by Board members – as chapter spokesperson, Daniel Bodenski said, “We wanted to model our meeting based on the national ones, where there’s a balance of learning about the latest trends and technologies from industry experts, participating in product demonstrations, and good networking opportunities.” Hosted by the Power Systems division of Milton CAT, the meeting attracted a large group of participants from around New England, eager to hear from the presenters – and from each other, too.

Milton CAT management, Power Systems staff as well as representatives from Caterpillar corporate who travelled especially for the occasion were on hand to greet visitors at Milton CAT’s headquarters in Milford, and attendants had a chance to have some refreshments and catch up with each other before the event officially started. Explaining their reasons for attending, some guests, such as Mike Hansen, expressed their belief in supporting their 7x24 chapter; others, including Business Continuity consultant Gregg F. Haley, stated the value of networking with their peers; and the opinion of several members is summarized by Edward Gutowski, who’s is also a committed member of the American Society of Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning or ASHRAE, and was very interested in listening to high-level technical presentations – “I saw who the speakers were, and I knew that being here would definitely be worthwhile.”

After a brief welcome and overview of the company from Milton CAT’s Electric Power Generation Sales Manager, Mike Flanigan, 7x24 chapter president Dale Hitchcock took the podium to review the agenda and introduce the first speaker, David Anderson, PE, an IBM veteran. The title of his lecture, “IBM – sharing the best and worst practices for greening data centers” says a lot about the candor and straightforward approach that characterized the presentation.

Taking advantage of his unparalleled experience in cost-savings through TCO studies and technology exploitation, Anderson shared stories and comments about what works, and what should be avoided; what are some easy to implement practices, and what are others that require lots of effort and resources, as well as posing lots of risks. Anderson was part of the Big Green Team that won the Gertsner award in 2007, and shows an unmatched, real-life knowledge of the paths to take and paths to avoid. Several participants actually commented on how “refreshing” and valuable it was to hear about companies making mistakes, recognizing them, and learning from them.

When the audience was invited to ask questions, participants did not have to be asked to speak up. Since the group included highly specialized IT engineers as well as busy, hands-on facilities managers, the questions were varied and interesting, representing the concerns from two factions that, although may be pursuing the same goals, don’t always do it speaking the same language. After a break, the second lecturer was introduced. Dr. Kishor Khankari from Syska & Hennesey – a consultant, developer of much used CFD tools for design engineers and author of numerous technical papers and articles on HVAC subjects, Dr. Khankari holds a PhD in computational fluid analysis from the University of Minnesota and is a member of the Board of Governors of the Detroit ASHRAE Chapter.

Addressing the subject of “Current best practices in data center design,” Dr. Khankari brought to life power and cooling needs, air carrying heat and moisture, and even servers clamoring for ventilation…The audience chuckled as Dr. Khankari used humor to describe the behavior of airflow and explain obscure laws of physics at work in a data center.

Managing the airflow in your data center means that you can improve cooling efficiency and make more power available for your IT equipment – a result that once again, proved dear to the hearts and minds of both IT engineers and facility managers. Dr. Khankari faced many, many questions from listeners who wanted to dig deeper into the explanations or who had comments and experiences that they wanted to share and compare.

After the presentations, 7x24 participants were invited to go to the Power Systems building, where a Product and Services Fair had been set up. This concept highlights several relevant products and services – in this case, for example, switchgears, standby generators, rental generators, the CAT UPS system… and allows visitors to have face-to-face time with the technical representative at each “station.” Manned by Milton CAT sales manager Scott McGee, the switchgear station was especially busy, as was the UPS product demonstration where Dave Gilmore explained to the visitors the reasons as to why CAT has moved away from the dual battery and generator concept and focused on generator-only, described as “more efficient, greener and generating less heat, which is a big concern in a data center.”

7x24 members were very pleased with this portion of the event. They mentioned that they seldom get to visit behind the scenes and see the core of a data center – the power equipment responsible for its 7x24 functioning. As Bodenski commented, it’s almost impossible to see firsthand the CAT C175, for example, the latest (and largest) CAT standby generator, simply because the floor of a regular building cannot support its weight!

Visitors crowded around the C175, and it was clear that several of its features talk straight to the concerns of the data center IT manager and to the facilities manager as well. One of them is improved breathing, enabling more cool air in and out of the engine which results in higher power ratings and lowered emissions; another one, its easy integration with other products such as UPSs and Switchgears; and let’s not forget to mention longer oil change intervals and overhaul periods, and reduced fuel consumption.

Milton CAT was also pleased with the event, “We believe it’s an instance of the proverbial WIN/WIN, commented Scott Martel, Vice President of the Power Systems Division, who said he believes there’s real value to the members of an association having an event hosted at Milton CAT – “They can get a hands-on experience of different products and services and ask questions in an informal, non-pressure atmosphere, while the event gives us, the Milton CAT staff, a great chance to better understand, in this case, the many challenges faced by IT engineers and facility managers.”