| 2N infrastructure | For data centre design, “N” refers to the minimum number of resources or amount of equipment required to operate an IT system. “2N” infrastructure means that there is twice the amount of required resources/capacity available in the system, in other words 100% redundancy or back-up. |
|---|
| Aisle | Aisle or aisles refer to a layout design for server racks and other computing equipment in a data centre. The aisle is the open channel or pathway between the racks. Data centre air flow management can utilise this channel to contain and direct hot or cold air. |
|---|
| Audit | An audit in this case indicates an energy or facility audit whereby a prescribed methodology is used to assess how much energy or resources (such as water, natural gas, etc.) a facility uses, and to identify ways to manage consumption of these resources. |
|---|
| Chillers | A chiller is a refrigeration system used to lower the temperature of machinery, industrial and commercial spaces, and process fluids by removing heat from the system and transferring it elsewhere. Chiller systems are beneficial for applications where strict operational temperatures are required. |
|---|
| Dashboard | A dashboard is a visual way of displaying various types of data in one place, including key performance indicators (KPI) or other important metrics that users need to see and understand at a glance. It is usually designed to convey different, but related information. |
|---|
| Data centre cooling | IT devices and equipment produce heat. Excess heat and humidity in data centres can damage devices and equipment, causing them to malfunction and stop working. Typical data centre cooling removes excess heat from the air and replaces it with cooler air using commercial air-conditioning equipment. Cooling can also be provided at the equipment level with specialized cooling devices. |
|---|
| Data centre operators | This wide-ranging category consists of users from corporate or enterprise data centres owned by corporations and managed in-house, to institutional and government data centres, to non-profit organizations, to data centres serving the education sector. There are also a few so-called “hyperscale” data centres – massive data centres owned and operated by large technology firms. |
|---|
| Data centre colocation providers | These consist of multi-tenant hosting facilities (also called colocation data centres), which include data centres owned by third parties and housing servers owned by companies as well as data centres that sell server services to companies that want to outsource the management of their own servers (managed hosting). |
|---|
| Data centre colocation users | Many businesses and public sector organizations are transitioning to managed services from owning their own servers and/or facilities to managed services through the use of colocation particularly to secure cloud computing with hyperscale providers. |
|---|
| Data Management | Data management is the practice of collecting, organizing, protecting, and storing data. As organizations create and consume increasingly large amounts of data, good data management practices and services are essential for these organizations to be able to manage vast quantities of data. |
|---|
| Data room area | A data room is a space in a data centre dedicated to housing racks of computer servers used for data processing and communications purposes. The data room area is the floor area dedicated to such equipment as well as supporting equipment, but not office space. |
|---|
| Enterprise data centre | An enterprise data centre is a physical facility that an organization owns and operates to store and process data and support its IT needs. A typical enterprise data centre houses an organization’s IT equipment such as routers, switches, servers, firewalls, and other components that enable critical applications and store and process data. |
|---|
| General practices | These indicate practices that apply to all building management procedures for energy or other resources rather than IT or DC specific procedures. For example, switching off unneeded lights is a general practice, while installing virtualization software is a DC-specific practice. |
|---|
| Hardware | Specific to data centres, the term “hardware” is used in reference to the physical infrastructure and equipment, including servers, storage devices, networking equipment, and other components, which enable DCs to handle data, process information, and service users. |
|---|
| Life cycle | Describes the phases of a product from raw materials to production, use and recycling or disposal. An LCA is a systematic analysis of environmental impact from these phases. |
|---|
| Measure | Also known as an energy efficient measure. As used in this document, an energy efficient measure is a procedure, process, activity, or piece of equipment that, when applied, reduces the amount of energy or resources required to perform the same task or produce the same result. |
|---|
| Metering | Metering is defined as the use of instrumentation and defined processes to measure and record physical parameters. In the context of energy efficiency, the purpose of metering is to accurately collect the data required for informed decision making, for example, to estimate the savings attributable to the implementation of energy efficiency measures (EEMs). |
|---|
| Metrics | Metrics are quantifiable indicators that can be measured and used to evaluate the effectiveness of processes or activities. With respect to data centres, many metrics exist that can provide data centre management and guidance to key stakeholders on different aspects of their operations. For example, there are metrics to measure a DC’s use of resources such as carbon, power, and water. |
|---|
| Network | A computer network is a system of interconnected computing devices that can exchange data and share resources with each other. These devices use defined communications protocols to transmit and receive information. |
|---|
| Part-load | HVAC systems can spend many of their operating hours in conditions other than their design maximum (where their efficiency is also highest). Part-load refers to the operation of an HVAC system when for heating or cooling demand is lower than its maximum capacity, and the system thus is not operating at their peak efficiency. |
|---|
| Practice | “Practice” refers to something that is usually or regularly done, often as a habit, tradition, or method. Specific to this document, “practice” refers to the use of procedures or methods required in DC operation. |
|---|
| Rack | A server rack is a cabinet designed to hold and organize IT equipment in a manner that is best for operation of the equipment and utilization of floor space. |
|---|
| Resilience | Specific to data centre operations, the term “resilience” refers to the ability of a data centre to remain operational and recover quickly from unexpected events such as natural disasters, power outages, cyber attacks, and other natural or man-made disruptions. |
|---|
| Servers | A server is a computing device designed specifically to process requests from other programs and devices and deliver responses to those requests via the internet or local network. |
|---|
| Storage | Data centre storage is an essential part of the data centre architecture. It is a term describing the electronic devices, software and processes that manipulate, manage and monitor data storage within a data centre. |
|---|
| Uninterruptible power supply | An uninterruptible power supply (UPS) is a type of power system that provides continual, automated backup electric power when the input power source or mains power fails. For data centre applications, a UPS provides near-instantaneous protection from input power interruptions by switching to energy stored in battery packs, supercapacitors or flywheels. |
|---|
| Virtualisation | Virtualisation is technology used to create virtual representations of servers, storage, networks, and other physical machines used in data centres. Virtual software can mimic the functions of physical hardware to run multiple virtual machines simultaneously on a single physical machine, fully utilising its capacity. |
|---|