IBM debuts green datacentre in a box

IBM has unveiled a range of new products designed to bolster its green credentials and help customers cut the energy footprint of their IT infrastructure.

The company, which last year pledged to invest $1bn in developing more energy efficient systems as part of its Project Big Green initiative, yesterday launched a new portfolio of modular, standardised datacentre designs that it claims can slash energy costs by up to 50 per cent compared to conventional server farms.

IBM said that by developing standardised datacentre designs it can slash the amount of time it takes to install new datacentre capacity, while also ensuring systems are optimised to keep energy use as low as possible.

A new "shrink-wrapped" modular datacentre that can be standardised for facilities ranging from 5,000 to 20,000 square feet forms the centrepiece of the new portfolio and is joined by a High Density Zone module that also allows firms to add capacity to existing datacentres.

The company has also launched its answer to rival Sun Microsystems' "Project Black Box" datacentre in a shipping container, in the form of a new portable "pod-like" datacentre that can similarly be fitted in a shipping container has been configured to operate at optimum energy efficiency.

Separately, the company also launched a new version of its storage virtualisation software, System Storage SAN Volume Controller (SVC) 4.3, designed to improve utilisation rates, energy efficiency, and application availability and scalability.

Enhancements to the updated system include space efficient virtual disks and FlashCopy, each of which offer better use of system resources, virtual disk monitoring, which stores two copies of the same disk on different systems, and much improved interoperability.

Announced alongside of this was IBM's System Storage Productivity Centre, a management console, which is designed to support SVC, and helps firm to pinpoint and remove duplicated and unnecessary data further cutting energy use.

The system will also identify seldom accessed files, meaning that firms can move them onto cheaper, or more energy efficient data storage systems such as tape.

Mike Daniels, senior vice-president and group executive for IBM Global Technology Services, said that the company was seeing soaring demand for its energy efficient technologies. "Since we announced IBM’s Project Big Green a year ago, we've engaged with thousands of businesses, governments and educational institutions around the world to help them address critical energy challenges in their data centres," he said.

A version of this story first appeared at BusinessGreen.com's sister title IT Week