Befriend your facilities pros

Though the notions of efficiently heating and cooling a data centre may be new to ITers, McFarlane says, facilities teams have been dealing with this for years. "IT managers aren't educated in the ways of energy consumption because they haven't come out of mechanical and engineering backgrounds," he says.

He recommends that IT teams form close relationships with facilities crews to learn about the demands of air conditioning, power and other infrastructure elements.

McFarlane teaches a class at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, New York, that helps IT managers understand facilities requirements. "Even if they are not responsible for facilities they have to understand it," he says. For instance, he says IT people are used to doing things overnight or within a day -- and that just doesn't happen in the facilities world. "Sometimes the part you need isn't available for weeks. You have to plan things out," he says.

Gartner's Kumar says he sees this communication already happening. "The traditional areas of demarcation are dissolving. Operationally, everyone is getting smarter. In the end, the CIO's best friend is going to be the facilities manager," he says.

Sidebar: Seeing "green"

Another trend in data centres is to make everything as energy efficient as possible. Michael Manos, senior director of data centre services at Microsoft, says that in his company's new data centres, "everything from the applications to the hardware to the facilities is taking into account how much energy is consumed. It's really about optimizing efficiency," he says.

Brian Pickett, data centre manager at IndyMac Bank, says his company is also worried about the effects of the data centre on the environment. "We're starting to look at energy efficiency based on the types of servers and architectures we need. We're starting to design our operations to be green," he says.

This turn toward the environment comes none too soon. Robert McFarlane, a principal at Shen Milsom and Wilke, says the government has been studying the effect of data centre energy consumption and could lay down federal mandates for conservation relatively soon. In fact, the Environmental Protection Agency has already extended its EnergyStar certification to computers, and manufacturers such as Hewlett-Packard are introducing wares to fit the bill. Private initiatives including The Green Grid are also coming to pass.

"They're trying to figure out what incentives would convince businesses to use energy-saving technologies," McFarlane says. Today, some power companies offer rebates for EnergyStar-certified product use. "But the paperwork to prove your usage can be so vexatious," he says.

But he says the breaking point is coming. "Going green has to take hold. Businesses are running up against a point where IT can't grow to support the needs of the data centre," McFarlane says. In fact, that day may already be here: Partners Healthcare System is expecting to save over $2 million with software to help shut down client computers when they're not in use.