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The business case for energy management in high-tech industries

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Abstract

The high-technology sector – characterized by facilities such as laboratories, cleanrooms, and data centers – is often where innovation first occurs. These facilities are sometimes referred to as the “racecars” of the buildings sector because new technologies and strategies to increase performance often trickle down to other building types. Although these facilities are up to 100 times as energy-intensive as conventional buildings, highly cost-effective energy efficiency opportunities are often overlooked. Facility engineers are in the trenches identifying opportunities to improve energy productivity but often are unable to make the broader business case to financial decision makers. This article presents the technical opportunities for reducing energy costs, along with their broader strategic value for high-tech industries.

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Notes

  1. Naughton, P. (2001). Energy savings turn into cash-flow savings. Semiconductor Fab Tech (December). See http://www.fabtech.org/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_download&gid=153.

  2. Koomey, J. (2007). Estimating total power consumption by servers in the USA and the world. http://hightech.lbl.gov/documents/DATA_CENTERS/svrpwrusecompletefinal.pdf.

  3. See http://hightech.lbl.gov/labs-mf.html.

  4. Blazek, M., Chong, H., Loh, W., & Koomey, J. G. (2004). Datacenters revisited: Assessment of the energy impact of retrofits and technology trends in a high-density computing facility. Journal of Infrastructure Systems, 10(3), 98.

  5. Placet, M., Winiarski, D., Heerwagen, J., Shankle, S., McMordie-Stoughton, K., Fowler, K., et al. (2003). The business case for sustainable design in federal facilities. US Department of Energy, Federal Energy Management Program. http://eetd.lbl.gov/emills/PUBS/Sustainable_Federal_Bldgs.html.

  6. Kats, G., Berman, A., Perlman, J., Alevantis, L., & Mills, E. (2003). The costs and financial benefits of green buildings: A report to California’s sustainable building task force. Washington, DC: Capital E, http://eetd.lbl.gov/emills/PUBS/Green_Buildings.html.

  7. Blazek, M., Rhodes, S., Kommomen, F., & Weidman, E. (1999). Tale of two cities: Environmental life cycle assessment for telecommunications systems: Stockholm, Sweden and Sacramento, CA. Proceedings of the International Symposium on Electronics and Environment, IEEE, May 11–13, 1999.

  8. See http://www.labs21century.gov.

  9. See http://www.thegreengrid.org/home.

  10. Mills, E., & Livingston, J. (2005). Traversing the valley of death. Forbes. November 18. See http://www.forbes.com/2005/11/17/utilities-emerging-tech-cz_1117energy_programs.html.

  11. See http://hightech.lbl.gov/benchmarking.html.

  12. See Tschudi, W., Rumsey, P., Mills, E., & Greenberg, S. (2005). Measuring and managing energy use in datacenters. HPAC Engineering (in press), LBNL/PUB-945 see http://hightech.lbl.gov/Documents/CLEANROOMS/HPAC_CR_BestPrac.pdf and Tschudi, W., Mills, E., Rumsey, P., & Xu, T. (2005). Measuring and managing energy use in cleanrooms. HPAC Engineering (in press), LBNL/PUB-946, see http://hightech.lbl.gov/Documents/DATA_CENTERS/HPAC_DC_BestPrac.pdf.

  13. Jeng, M.-S., Xu, T., & Lan, C.-H. (2004). Toward green systems for cleanrooms: Energy efficient fan filter units. Proceedings of SEMI Technology Symposium: Innovations in Semiconductor Manufacturing, SEMICON West 2004. San Francisco (July) pp 73–77. LBNL-55039. http://hightech.lbl.gov/Documents/LBNL55039_TXu.pdf.

  14. See http://securebuildings.lbl.gov/.

  15. Rocky Mountain Institute (2003). Design recommendations for high-performance datacenters: Report of the integrated design charette.

  16. Stansberry, M. (2005). Power-saving technologies in the datacenter. TechTarget Network (November 10). See http://searchdatacenter.techtarget.com/originalContent/0,289142,sid80_gci1144396,00.html.

  17. Ton, M., Fortenbery, B., & Tschudi, W. (2007). DC power for improved data center efficiency. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Report, http://hightech.lbl.gov/documents/DATA_CENTERS/DCDemoFinalReportJan17–07.pdf.

  18. For example, see the 80 PLUS program (http://www.80plus.org/) for desktop computers and servers with efficient power supplies.

  19. See http://www.pge.com/news/news_releases/q4_2006/061108.html.

  20. Mills, E., & Sartor, D. (2004). Energy use and savings potential for laboratory fume hoods. Energy, 30, 1859–1864. LBNL-55400. http://eetd.lbl.gov/emills/PUBS/Fume_Hood_Energy.html.

  21. Bell, G., Sartor, D., & Mills, E. (2001). Development and commercialization of a high-performance laboratory fume hood. LBNL-48983 (rev.) http://eetd.lbl.gov/emills/PUBS/BerkeleyHood.html.

  22. Tschudi, W. T., Faulkner, D., & Hebert, A. (2005). Energy efficiency strategies for cleanrooms without compromising environmental conditions. ASHRAE Transactions, 111(pt. 2, paper no. DE-05–9–1), 637–645.

  23. Hydeman, M., Seidel, R., & Shalley, C. (2005). Staying on-line: Datacenter commissioning. ASHRAE Journal, pp. 60–65, April. See http://hightech.lbl.gov/DCTraining/docs/wsjon-data-ctr-power.pdf.

  24. Mills, E., Friedman, H., Powell, T., Bourassa, N., Claridge, D., Haasl, T., & Piette, M. A. (2004). The cost-effectiveness of commercial-buildings commissioning: A meta-analysis of energy and non-energy impacts in existing buildings and new construction in the united states. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory Report No.56637 http://cx.lbl.gov.

  25. Bell, G., Sartor, D., & Mills, E. (2001). op cit.

  26. Clark, D. (2005). Power-hungry computers put datacenters in bind - newer hardware guzzles electricity and spews heat, requiring costly alterations. Wall Street Journal, p. A1 (14 November). See http://hightech.lbl.gov/DCTraining/Documents/WSJondatacenterpower051114.pdf.

  27. Calwell, C., & Griffith, B. (2005). Enabling high efficiency power supplies for servers: Update on industry, government and utility initiatives. Presented at the Intel Developer Forum. Cited benefits correspond to a change from 70 to 83% efficiency. See http://hightech.lbl.gov/Presentations/PTMS009-IDF-2005-final.ppt.

  28. Xu, T. (2005). Investigating the performance of a minienvironment system. Presentation at Contamination Control Technical Session, The 51st ESTECH Conference May 1–4, 2005, Hyatt Regency Woodfield, Schaumburg, Illinois, The Institute of Environmental Sciences and Technology (IEST). http://hightech.lbl.gov/Presentations/Minienv_ESTECH2005.ppt Technical paper published in the Proceedings of The 51st ESTECH Conference.

  29. Blazek, M, Rhodes, S., Kommomen, F., & Weidman, E. (1999). Tale of two cities: Environmental life cycle assessment for Telecommunications Systems: Stockholm, Sweden and Sacramento, CA. Proceedings of the International Symposium on Electronics and Environment, IEEE, May 11–13.

  30. Naughton (2001), op cit.

  31. Mills, E. (2004). Amplifying real estate value through energy & water management: From ESCO to ‘energy services partner.’ Proceedings of the 2004 ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Buildings, Asilomar, CA August 22–27. LBNL-52768. http://eetd.lbl.gov/emills/PUBS/EnergyServicesPartners.html.

  32. U.S. Green Buildings Council. N/D. “Making The Business Case for High Performance Green Buildings.” USGBC, Washington, DC, 12 pp. See http://www.wgba.org/artman/uploads/making_the_business_case-cd.pdf.

  33. Mills, E., Abell, D., Bell, G., Faludi, J., Greenberg, S., Hitchcock, R., Piette, M. A., Sartor, D., & Stum, K. (2002). Design intent tool: User guide. LBNL/PUB-3167. http://eetd.lbl.gov/emills/PUBS/Design_Intent_Tool.html.

Acknowledgment

This work was supported by the Director, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, of the US Department of Energy under contract no. DE-AC02-05CH11231, the California Energy Commission’s Public Interest Energy Research Program (PIER), and the Pacific Gas and Electric Company. Helpful review comments were provided by Jonathan Livingston, Bruce Nordman, and two anonymous referees. This article is based on an earlier report by the same authors.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, MS90-4000, USA

    Evan Mills

  2. Genentech, 1 DNA Way, South San Francisco, CA, 94080-4990, USA

    Gary Shamshoian

  3. Environment, Health and Safety; AT&T Services, Inc., 179 Bothin Road, Fairfax, CA, 94930, USA

    Michele Blazek

  4. Applied Materials, 9700 US Hwy 290 East, Austin, TX, 78724, USA

    Phil Naughton

  5. Critical Facility Associates, 1102 Lautrec Terrace, Sunnyvale, CA, 94087, USA

    Robert S. Seese

  6. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, MS90-3111, USA

    William Tschudi & Dale Sartor

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  1. Evan Mills
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Correspondence to Evan Mills.

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Submitted to the Journal of Energy Efficiency.

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Mills, E., Shamshoian, G., Blazek, M. et al. The business case for energy management in high-tech industries. Energy Efficiency 1, 5–20 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12053-007-9000-8

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