A
A Detailed Study Report
on
Sustainability Transformation &
Data Center Digitalization
Submitted by
Sibaji Pattanaik
REGD. NO. 77220585778
(BATCH 2021-22)
A Report Submitted for the fulfillment
OF
PGDBM PROGRAM ON ITSM OF NMIMS (DISTANCE)
DATE OF SUBMISSION: 22.11.2022
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Through this report, I take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude and thanks the academic
fraternity at NMIMS (Distance) for having such a dedicated system in place, where students like me
are given the opportunity to learn about their areas of interest, irrespective of commitment in their
professional carrier, working in their respective field. Through this process of research, I
acknowledge the efforts of research bodies like Gartner, PwC, Mckinsey, IDG, Uptime Institute,
IDC, and TechTarget, DCD, in providing detailed technical information on website along with
various research papers, survey reports, Hand books and finally making the whole process easy in
terms of information compilation and analysis along with better understanding of Data center
practices. The whole information is analysed in the area of sustainable design, build and operation
of data center, unifying Data center ecosystem, standardize & accomplish benefits (tangible and
intangible) with uptime, and risk mitigation while optimizing energy & other resource consumption,
and creating the bridge of information across organizational domains – Data Center Ops, Facilities,
and IT to maximize capacity utilization and productivity improvement.
Also, I am grateful to all my family members who have given me all kinds of support at various
stages, especially in last 3 years during Covid’19 pandemic situation. Thank you so much, my dear
wife, Sujata, to encourage and support me throughout my post graduate management program. Last
but not the least; I want to thank to both of my children, Devansi, & Sai Satyam, for being my
constant source of joy in my academic journey.
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Executive summary submitted in fulfilment of the requirement of PGDBM – Information
Technology & Systems Management (ITSM) Program of NMIMS (Distance).
Student Name: Sibaji Pattanaik Enrolment No: 77220585778
Title of the Project:
“Sustainability Transformation & Data Center Digitalization” - A core Business Model by
integrating People, Process & Technology!
In this study, thrust is on Data center digitalization for Performance improvement
and life cycle cost optimization by focusing on People, Process & System
Technology has been the integral part of day-to-day life. More than 4.5 billion people i.e., 50 to 60%
of the world’s population having internet access through their devices. It has been found that there
is an exponential rate of rise in data generation, with the numbers now reaching astronomical levels.
In fact, in 2017 alone, 2.5 quintillion bytes of data was generated each day.
Growing demand of digitalization across enterprises, rising number of smart devices with 5G
network fabrics, cloud computing, expanding data consumption and higher productivity is driving
the growth of hyperscale data centers. As per industry report, about half the world’s data will be
hosted on the cloud by 2025, creating demand for infrastructure while is agile, energy-efficient, cost-
effective, resilient, scalable, and self-sustainable.
Data center is a facility that delivers shared access to applications and data using a complex network,
compute, and storage infrastructure. The key components of a data center design include CPU, OS,
routers, switches, firewalls, storage systems, servers, network and application-delivery controllers
along with efficient cooling system and reliable power supply.
According to International Energy Agency, Data centers consume approximately 200 terawatt-hours
(TWh) of electricity, or nearly one percent of global electricity demand, while contributing to 0.3%
of all global CO2 emissions. These intense energy-consuming sites must run 24x7 with a focus on
operational efficiency, energy efficient system and embracing renewable energy sources. It has been
seen that there is a limitation to reduce power usage effectiveness (PUE) close to 1.1 considering
efficient selection of devices, data center density (w/sf) and other techno-economic reasons. Hence
it is needed to focus on renewable source or carbon free energy usage 24/7 for sustainable operation
of data center.
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What matters most for business is not the volume of data but, rather, knowing how to use it to take
proactive business decision making and cost optimization without compromising capacity and
unplanned failures. The focus is on operational cost reduction and greater sustainability with unified
data analytics system to reduce energy consumption and create operational efficiencies that save on
costs. At the same time, reduced energy consumption leads to a smaller carbon footprint, supporting
sustainability efforts.
Impact of climate change are causing uncertainty for digital industries and data center management.
The recent Paris Agreement is a legally binding international treaty on climate change. More and
more countries, regions, cities and companies are establishing carbon neutrality targets. In my study,
this is the origin, where the organization has to redefine business goal and make right strategy to
mitigate the effect of emission by constructing building space with low embedded energy material,
energy efficient design with optimum capacity utilisation, star rated equipment, passive cooling, and
more dependency on renewable resources, storage system.
It is not only designing data center by addressing climate change, but it is also important to focus on
data center capacity utilization, overall equipment effectiveness (OEE), digitize operation and
maintenance practices with unified monitoring, to optimize the life cycle cost with better ROI. As
per the study, the three top most reasons of data center failure are related power failure, equipment
failure and human error. In addition, factors affecting performance of data center are not at tier level,
it covers, location, design, construction, CFD analysis, thoroughness of commissioning program,
effective O&M practices.
Digitalization & Data driven enterprises, need an energy efficient and reliable data center with 24x7
cost effective, safe & transparent operation with highly secured low latency network. Digitalization
is an integrated part in driving business by capturing the real time data in a single pane of glass
visibility by integrating IT & OT system with an ability to monitor uptime, predicting equipment
failure, deriving insights from the dynamic nature of site operation, and meeting the customer
demand. However, the focus is to maintain human-centric approach by putting core human needs
and purpose and ask “How technology will support in resolving day-to-day operation issues of data
center”.
Looking into complexity, visibility of multisite, virtualization, Internet of Things, automation,
physical size, smooth & efficiency functioning of Data Center and SLA, technology like data center
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infrastructure management (DCIM) solution/unified computing platform, sustainability, green
technology delivering the speed and scale are necessary for systemwide transformation in a Data
center. (As per TRAI report, DCIM not only streamlines the costs of operation of data centers but
also ensures sustainability by reducing carbon foot print).
Most DCIM suites offer 2 core functions:
Monitoring & device management – awareness of device/environmental health and security
status changes, trends, and alarms
Planning & modeling – simulating adds, moves, changes; risk analysis, capacity optimization
Objective of the Study:
The main objective behind study is:
To make the data center carbon neutral
Efficient design, effective capacity utilization & Reliable operation of Data center by
integrating IT&OT stack along with unified analytics (analyzing, generating report and
interpreting data to look for trends, and turn all that data into actionable insights)
To reduce the overall life cycle cost (LCC) of Data center (Focusing on the maintenance
and operating costs of assets along with capital expenditure, can deliver substantial long-
term financial and environmental benefits)
With a single pane of glass, unified monitoring, we shall be able to make better business decisions.
However, there are a few requirements for ensuring this data will actually be useful:
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1. The first requirement is monitoring everything and gathering data from every valid
source/linking all IT & OT related system within in the facility.
2. The second is analyzing and interpreting that data to look for trends, and turn all that data
into actionable insights.
3. The third is having a flexible dashboard which allows for data customization and custom
visual report generation.
To achieve the objectives, detailed literature study was carried out covering following area
Role of culture as an integral part of digitalization and sustainability design (sustainable
policy, responsible leadership and engagement of CTO, embedding technology, integrity &
transparency, continuous education, training and assessment as the core of business)
Understand the need for adoption of sustainability (energy, waste, water) in data center
design along with reliable & efficient operation practices
Recognise the need for resilience workforce, bridging information across facility &, IT to
maximize utilization of data center capacity (server), high uptime and high productivity.
Engagement of sustainable digital partner to provider solution to improve reliability, energy
efficiency, visualisation, operation workflow, and reducing the operation cost/Holistic DC
infra. Management platform with continuous measurement and verification and certification.
Linking to core business process to increase brand values, user experience and customer
retention. Focus is to turn Maintenance from a Cost Centre into a Profit Centre.
“A successful program requires cooperation, dedication, and participation at all levels and cannot
succeed without everyone involved understanding the basic principles and supporting the cause.”
Methodology:
The Research methodology is based on Secondary data on sustainable design of data center, its
benefits and data driven of energy centric maintenance practices to enhance user experience,
improving reliability and cost-effective data center operation.
Gone through various research papers, survey to find out the key variables or the influencing factors
are organization culture, multidisciplinary skill set, cross-functional collaboration, applying DevOp
methodology, in developing sustainable/Net-zero data center design. In the process digitalization
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will support by reducing carbon foot print, efficient operation, increasing uptime, effective capacity
utilisation and optimize the data center life cycle cost.
The data (secondary) is collected from various research papers, articles, theses, books and
magazines. The inclusion/exclusion criteria were adopted for observational studies.
Finding/Observations
Data Center Decarbonization & Digitalization go hand in hand. In this research, following are the
list of findings that could influence sustainability practices, digitalization & decarbonization drive
to provide new revenue and value-producing opportunities.
1. Company’s Culture (Sustainable policy, CTO role, compliance framework, Upskill program,
and processes) (Sustainability in the DNA of all process in the Organisation)
2. Digital Strategy (Budget for desigitalisation, life cycle costing, Unified Digital Platform for
reliable system operation and control) (Focus on measurement & technology)
3. Demographic variables, (i.e., gender, age, level of educational, multi-disciplinary skill set,
resilience workforce) (Focus on accountability)
4. Well defined Scope and digital solution, with right Business partner engagement (Deliver
stakeholder expectation and requirements)
As mentioned above, organization culture plays a very important role in bringing the sustainable
transformation and business benefits.
Recommendations:
For successful transformation, following are the key steps need to be considered.
1. Integrating Culture addressing Sustainability as core business function, Engagement of top
leader. Due diligence should be performed for successful accomplishment of goal.
2. Define Business Cases (Demonstrate the value and benefits the project brings to the business
covering problems/challenges, code of conduct, finances, risks, Scalability, TCO,
maintenance issues along with return on investment) and the goal Statement.
3. Decarbonization intervention considering both embedded and operation carbon. Highest
availability with a holistic view in selecting size for specific modular construction, cooling,
Power, Fire & Security, Network and server level dedicated Devices & Metering
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4. Engagement of multidisciplinary skill set, experienced manpower along with integrating
technology partner
5. Apply all latest standards applicable in design selection of electrical system, HVAC, and
equipment availability standards, capacity utilisation and sustainability building rating
system. Equipment (OT) capacity selection should be as per Data center Reck capacity
finalization.
6. Gap analysis during Data center design execution assessment covering 5 steps of
commissioning, competency evaluation, and setting of new benchmarks, strategy to retain
talent with skillset upgradation, and change management (people side of change)
7. IT&OT assets, identification, device location, and description. Hardware/software that
resides in the data center, monitoring devices (IOT) along with their configuration and floor
plan with as-built drawing.
8. Apply agile methodology to develop and deploy unified data management system for
prescriptive analytics and data driven decision making. This will broadly cover capacity
utilization, trend analysis, generate alerts/FDD (fault detection and diagnosis), control the
processes covering both data center’s IT&OT component in a single platform with reliable
and optimise operation and maintenance, auto ticketing and improve productivity.
9. Persona mapping, defining key performance indicator (KPI), apply analytics to display
information on the status of the asset health, alarm generation on energy performance,
capacity utilization of IT assets, emission level, condition of assets, work flow/change
management, safety, space, power, cooling and connectivity within the data center
10. Focus on data center's layout based on energy consumption and ambient profile, or avoid
selecting conventional equipment and target for star rated, more energy-efficient ones with
optimum capacity utilization.
11. Invest in sustainable computer processing hardware, and implement high-efficiency power
and cooling infrastructure by engaging sustainable digital partner
12. Build cross functional work methodology and upskill with continuous training program
13. Implementation of carbon offset Program and carbon trading
14. Green certification for Data centers like IGBC, LEED, BREEAM etc.
Transformation levers to Deliver 21st Century Data Center
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Building Design & Operation Energy Performance Carbon offset
Infrastructure Management Program
Data Center Design Resource Energy Efficiency Carbon offset Strategy
Build Strategy efficiency/usage
Low embodied energy Resilience workforce Energy transition to Partner/Project
materials with multidisciplinary Renewable Identification/and or
IT & OT integration skill set due Diligence
Smart metering Unified Computing Monitoring Cost
PQ Metering Platform effectiveness through End-to-End Portfolio
NB-IOT Predictive Analytics Critical assets with management
Device/Smart Sensor Managing operational energy centric
Deployment emissions maintenance
Zero Ozone depletion
equipment
Certification & Reporting
LEED/ IGBC/BREEAM Certification Assessment of ESG matrix, emissions, energy,
water and resource use and reporting as per
ESG framework i.e., SASB/DJSI/GRI
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Digital Transformation solution stages
Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3 Stage 4 Stage 5
Discovery Scope Business
case Develop Test & Launch
Validate
Solutions Definition, Custom Custom Deploy,
Uncover
mapping functional apps if any, software announce,
challenges,
innovation design integration, test, L&D,
discover the
specificatio algorithm integration modify
art of the
ns (FDS), training test, SOPs
possible,
prioritize use cost, value, machine
cases schedule learning test
Reliability challenges – Equipment failure/low asset utilization/downtime, uptime, MRO Cost
Maintenance challenges – Keeping up with PM, CBM, Uptime, planned vs unplanned work
Process/Energy – Emissions, carbon footprint, losses, equipment inefficiency, energy cost, LCC
Health & Safety – Incidents involving personnel and the environment, incident cost
Production – Bottlenecks, grade changes, physical vs virtual server, weather condition,
operation cost
Cyber Security – NIST 800-53 PE & FISMA, SSAE-18 (SOC-1), ISO 27001
Quality – Off-spec product, quality giveaway (IEC 62591) for WSN, OPA-UA (IEC62541)
Study Limitation
Due to data privacy and competition, it is difficult to collect primary data from the reputed IT
firms. However, all analysis is carried out based on secondary data from reputed source, and having
own exposure working in similar field. I have presented the facts and figures in this report.
The information is compiled from the primary survey carried out by renowned survey agencies.
Most of the organization, corporate firms rely on their survey and take business decisions. This
research is carried out on a global issue and would bring limitations in deriving conclusion without
considering geographical influence. Regression analysis can be carried out to confirm the
hypothesis by considering a certain population of data centers across the specific region and their
operating energy cost ($) can be analysed with actual quantum of (TB) data handled per month,
kW/cabinet,
NMIMS-ITSM cooling utilization (tons), PUE, input voltage to PDUs, rack cooling area avg.
temperature (oC) and dew point (oC).
In addition, actual operating cost can be corelated with sustainability policy along with recruitment
of CTO/responsible leadership, No. of workforce in (30-45) age group, qualification and size of data
center (sq), legal compliance (Yes/No), Digitised maintenance with Unified computing tool
(Yes/No), green building certified (Yes/No), Number Data center Metrics used for operation
benchmarking and control like PUE and IT load W/sf per month. ROI can be computed by capturing
data related to Capex, Opex, benefits achieved compared to baseline energy consumption, % IT
capacity utilization (Rack Units utilization, network & Data center panel port utilization, floor
utilization in sq.ft), unplanned downtime (Minutes), % virtualization), % generation from renewable
source.
Study Conclusion:
In standard designing of data center, it is observed that 360-degree approach to sustainable
construction and adoption digitalized practices is missing. It is observed that there are many factors
which affect the decision to adopt sustainable practices, such as company culture, leadership with
digital mindset, strategy, motivated & multiskilled workforce along with engagement of reliable
partner ecosystem.
Reduction of carbon foot print, system reliability improvement, unified view of facility operation,
data driven decision making, ROI and improving productivity, are the key to have better user
experience, competitive operation and improve service level agreement (SLA).
As reported throughout this study, many businesses struggle with poor vision, strategy because of
leadership issues, demography choice to drive digitalization, managing data center assets and thus
leave themselves vulnerable to many dangerous risks.
As a solution, a step-by-step approach has been devised to pinpoint the challenges for sustainable
transformation, convergence of IT & OT system and efficient use of all resources.
Key Words: Sustainability, Net-Zero/Zero-carbon solution, Power Quality, Agile, harmonics,
Uptime, Training, Strategy, Demography, Resilience, DCIM, sustainable design certification, ESG,
IT & OT convergence, cyber-physical and cyberinformation system, NB-IoT, Green Certification
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A Company Commitment to Sustainability (A Model Sustainability Policy)
Vision:
It is in the best interests of our company and society as a whole that our company moves along the
path to sustainability. To that end, we will strive to achieve the following vision of performance:
1. Economic success: the wise use of financial resources
a. Company Economic Prosperity Our business is positioned to survive and prosper economically.
b. Community Economic Prosperity We help our community survive and prosper economically.
2. Social responsibility: respect for people
a. Respect for Employees We treat our employees in a respectful, fair, non-exploitative way,
especially with regard to compensation and benefits; promotion; training; open, constructive
dialogue with management; involvement in decision making; working conditions that are safe,
healthy, and non-coercive; rights of association, collective bargaining, and privacy;
employment termination practices; and work-life balance.
b. Diversity, Fair Hiring Practices We promote diversity and use hiring practices that are fair,
responsible, non-discriminatory, and non-exploitative for our employees, board members, and
suppliers.
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c. Responsible Governance We manage our risks properly, use our economic power responsibly,
and operate our business in a way that is ethical and legal.
d. Respect for Stakeholders We are transparent, respectful, and fair to local populations, investors,
suppliers, and other stakeholders outside our organization who may be affected by our
operations. We work collaboratively with our communities to enhance the well-being of others.
e. Fair Dealing with Customers We are honest and fair with our customers, competing fairly for
their business, respecting their privacy, and providing them safe and effective products and
services under the conditions we promise.
3. Environmental responsibility: respect for life and the wise management and use of natural
resources
a. Resource Conservation We conserve our use of natural resources to the extent practicable.
b. Waste Prevention and Management We reduce to the extent practicable the quantity and degree
of hazard of the wastes we generate from our operations, and handle them in a safe, legal, and
responsible way to minimize their environmental effects.
c. Environmental Risk Control and Restoration We minimize the risk of spills and other potentially
harmful environmental incidents, restore the environment where damaged by us, and enhance it
to better support biodiversity.
d. Reduction of Supply Chain Impacts We work with others in our supply chain to help assure
adverse environmental impacts and risks associated with our products and services are reduced
and properly controlled, and environmental benefits optimized.
e. Collaboration with Communities
We collaborate with our communities to protect and improve the environment.
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