12 Feb 2009

Energy-efficient facility is underway

Designers are working on a new energy-efficient facility at a North American university, a source claims.

Plans are underway for a green data centre to be built on Syracuse University's south campus, with the aim of opening in late autumn, the Daily Orange reports.

The building will house information pertaining to the educational establishment, such as student records and findings by the research team.

Eric Beattie, director of the office of campus planning, design and construction at the university, tells the news provider the current hall for the mainframe has been in existence for over 100 years.

He comments: "We determined [that] the university needed to completely rebuild that facility or build a new one."

Temperature controls will be put in place for the building, which is also set to have a power backup system as "computer centres consume a lot of energy", he concludes.

Built close to Cambridge University, BNB's new Elean Data Centre claims to partly operate on energy derived from a nearby power station, which reduces output costs by over a quarter.