TECH TALK
the highest level of reliability. A
comprehensive definition is provided
by the American Society of Heating,
Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning
Engineers (ASHRAE) which states that
the focus of commissioning is “verifying
and documenting that the facility and
all of its systems and assemblies are
planned, designed, installed, tested,
operated and maintained to meet the
needs of the owner.”
Done right, this essential service can
deliver a host of benefits to data
centre owners.
performance, reduce maintenance and
administrative overheads and even scale
back energy requirements, resulting in
lower utility bills.
Return on investment
Closely related to the above stated
reduced cost of operations, the
returns on investment offered by
commissioning are truly impressive.
While two to three year return periods
are the norm for most system-related
investments, ROI on commissioning is
not only experienced faster, but often
far exceeds the cost of the service itself.
Higher availability and fewer repairs
“ROI on
commissioning
is not only
experienced
faster, but
often far
exceeds the
cost of the
service itself.”
the various physical infrastructure
subsystems – power, cooling, fire
suppression, security, and management
– will work together. As a result, one of
the most valuable exercises- data centre
commissioning- is often overlooked with
its benefits unrealised.
Commissioning is the process that
reviews and tests the data centre’s
physical infrastructure design as a
holistic system in order to assure
www.intelligentcio.com
With ongoing digital transformation
across all industry verticals, business
reliance on IT has increased to
unprecedented levels. Along with this,
keeping mission-critical applications and
data always available to employees and
customers is now a key IT requirement.
Perhaps therefore the greatest value of
commissioning is its ability to prevent or
greatly reduce downtime.
In all recent AESG projects, the potential
cost impact of issues discovered and
addressed during commissioning was far
greater than the cost of the service. And
these were conservative estimates too
as they only accounted for the cost of
labour and material, without factoring
the significant productivity and revenue
losses businesses could face as a result
of downtime.
Getting it right
Commissioning ensures all systems in
the data centre are properly integrated.
It identifies single points of failure and
remedies these with redundancy. In
addition to mitigating system-related
failures, the process also ensures data
centre management and operations
teams are well-trained and well-equipped,
thereby reducing the possibility of
human error leading to downtime.
Fast fixes and fewer changes
Under the oversight of a Commissioning
Authority (CxA), projects experience
fewer change orders, delays, and rework,
avoiding the considerable costs of
late occupancy, liquidated damages,
extended equipment rentals, and other
costs associated with delays.
Reduced costs
Commissioning is part of the
implementation phase so its benefits
are realised from the very start of data
centre operation through the entire life
cycle. Well integrated systems that have
been tuned and optimised offer better
Commissioning is a reliability science
that documents and validates the result
of a data centre’s design/build process.
Placed in the context of an entire data
centre deployment, commissioning
should be part of the implementation
phase and within this, it should come
after the physical infrastructure systems
have been delivered, assembled,
installed, and individually started up.
Once commissioning is complete, formal
orientation and training of data centre
staff can begin.
Every piece of equipment should be
tested by executing a sequenced failure
followed by a restart and return-to-
stable operation. A sequenced failure
implies that a failure in one component,
such as a generator, is communicated
to a second related component, such
as the air conditioning system, so that
the second component can act in
an appropriate manner to minimise
downtime or to be ready for action
when power is restored. This testing
cycle should be performed on each
component and also on the entire
INTELLIGENTCIO
95