---
title: Some Facts about Data Center Inefficiency
date: 2009-05-01T10:59:25Z
modified: 2009-05-01T10:59:25Z
permalink: "https://redmonk.com/jgovernor/some-facts-about-data-center-inefficiency/"
type: post
status: publish
excerpt: ""
wpid: 1986
categories:
  - Uncategorized
timestamp: 2009-05-01T10:59:25Z
tags:
  - Uncategorized
---

![](http://www-03.ibm.com/ibm/history/exhibits/vintage/images/4506VV2227.jpg)

I recently [posted about Tivoli Pulse](http://www.redmonk.com/jgovernor/2009/04/24/magic-at-ibm-pulse-2009/), but it seems I also had some other notes in the hopper. For example – I found these facts cited by IBM pretty interesting. I think you may too.

> - Over 78% of data centers were built before dotcom era
> - **Data centers use 10-30x more energy per square foot than office space**
> - For every 100 units of energy piped into a data center, only about 3 units are used for actual computing- more than half is cooling.
> - in distributed computing environments up to **85% of computing capacity can sit idle**

With those facts in mind, Tivoli has

a. integrated energy management into all of its console and service management tooling, enabling chargeback and accountability for energy throughout IT. This information can be used for carbon credits or utility rebates in certain geographies.

b. signed deals with building management firms like Johnson Controls and Siemens, to ensure information about energy consumption in facilities can be correlated with IT usage.

All of this stuff is driving IBM’s Dynamic Infrastructure story. Cote was at an event with that team this week, and cites some relevant numbers in his [regular roundup](http://www.redmonk.com/cote/2009/04/30/numbers11/), so I might as well include them too! 😉

- **70% of data centers were built before 1985**, and will need rebuilding ([via @merv](http://twitter.com/merv/statuses/1649845819)).
- Waste makes opportunity: “**85% idle compute capacity. $40B of supply chain wasted. 70 cents per dollar just to run the systems. 1.5x data doubles every 18 months.**” (Jim Stallings’ slide)
- Of **IBM’s 194 datacenters worldwide** (just **under 6M sq ft**), IBM’s own **operations are run in just 7** ([via @jeunice](http://twitter.com/jeunice/statuses/1650211703))

Automation and Virtualisation are the key technologies available today to improve data center efficiency. Sometime in the future Cloud Computing will be another potential avenue of improvement.

disclosure: IBM is a client. The numbers here were supplied by the firm.