Digital disruption in Sydney’s data centre market
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Digital Reality spearheading Sydney’s data centre market with digital disruption WRIT TEN BY
NIKI WA LDEGR AVE PRODUCED BY
GLEN WHITE
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Digital Realty has just opened its third Sydney facility. Its Director of Construction, Daniel Howard, tells Niki Waldegrave why it’s so important to the APAC footprint
D
igital Realty prides itself on delivering a portfolio of data centre solutions with a record of 99.999% uptime
for the past 11 consecutive years, equating 04
to more than 1.7 billion operating minutes, unmatched by any other data centre provider in the world. It has more than 195 centres globally across over 30 markets throughout Europe, North America, Asia and Australia, servicing top-tier clients including Facebook, IBM, AT&T, LinkedIn and Equinix. Its Sydney data centres are hugely important to its Asia-Pacific business and SYD 11 – its new Digital Erskine Park 2 Data Centre – is the new kid on the block, following the adjacent SYD 10 facility. The SYD11 facility on 13-23 Templar Road is the largest facility the business has built in Australia and is located adjacent to its existing data centre in Erskine Park, which opened in November 2012.
It opened to much fanfare on the 15th November and is a 16.8MW two-storey, six-data hall facility data centre with office space. MV Power Generation (11kV) is installed within the SYD11 facility, capable of efficient and fast demand response and to date, the capital investment for the facility is around $100 million, with another $50-100 million to go. “We’re just finishing at the moment, putting the final polish on,” says Daniel Howard, Digital Realty’s Director of Construction APAC. “It’s a two-story data centre and we are using the lightest technology in lithium battery UPSs, which has given us a much more streamlined footprint, so we can fit more power into a small space in comparison to our previous generation data centres, such as the SYD10 Erskine Park I facility. “We’ve got MV Power Generation so we’ve got the ability to come off grid quite simply now and can support the whole site with generation. This allows us to match the generation capacity to the load experienced at the time, whereas, with the traditional or low-voltage generation system you can’t really w w w.di gi t a l re a lt y. a s ia
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align your generators that well with the
Interest in the building is off the scale
load, so you can quite often end up run-
due to Sydney being a global hotspot
ning more generators than you require.
for innovation. It boasts the biggest
“But with the MV generation, we can
tech start-up ecosystem in Australia
select which generators are required
and ranks 16th among 20 cities on the
and match it to the load that’s experi-
Start-up Ecosystem Index, with 64%
enced on that day. We’ve completely
of Australian tech startups in Sydney.
fitted-out the first level – half the building
“The demand that’s in the market in
– with IT power ready to go so you can
Sydney at the moment is unprecedented
power-on generators.”
with regards to data centre capacity,”
The next phase to be fitted-out with
adds Howard, who is an expert in the
UPSs, generators and capacity is
delivery of complex data centre projects,
the ground floor, and that should be
with experience in project management,
completed by the middle of next year.
design management, construction
E R S K INE PA R K , S Y DNE Y
Digital Erskine Park 2 is a new facility located adjacent to our existing data centre in Erskine Park. It is a 19MW facility to be built in phase with 9MW ready in Q4, 2018. Digital Erskine Park 2 has the ability to reach out to PIPE-IX , the 2nd largest IX in Australia in Digital Erskine Park 1.
w w w.di gi t a l re a lt y. a s ia
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management and property development. He built the SYD10 Erskine Park I facility in his previous role at FDC Construction before moving client side. “This building may be completely filled up within a year of its opening, which is exciting in itself. We have existing customers that are energising or going live very soon after we hand it over to them, so we’ve fitted-out two of the six data halls and we’re in discussions about the remaining four data halls to be leased. “We’ve built-in the SCEC requirements within the fabric of the building so that any 08
customer coming in can upgrade their data suites to SCEC which allows for the government work. It’s exciting to see so much interest in the building, and in contrast to our previous buildings, that has probably been a steady fill over a four-year period.” When it comes to construction, the business’ partners include key contractors, including A.W Edwards, Barnwell Cambridge for electrics, D&W Plumbing, Cummins, Schneider and Parratech. “Construction is always challenging,” he explains, “but we’ve got well-established relationships – and when you’re working with people that have worked with you before, it makes it a lot easier.
“ The demand that’s in the market in Sydney at the moment is unprecedented with regards to data centre capacity” — Daniel Howard, Director of Construction, Digital Reality
CLICK TO WATCH : ‘DIGITAL ERSKINE PARK 2 — CONSTRUCTION UPDATE IN SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA’ 09 “We grab our knowledge from across the globe. We’ve got our design construction centre in Boston and we use our experience across all the facilities globally in both building construction techniques and technology.” The cooling system in SYD11 is a Vertiv DSE CRAC unit with rooftop condensers which provide indirect free cooling via pumped refrigerant technology achieving an industry leading PUE. “It’s what they call an ‘indirect free cooling system’,” he adds. “It has a roof-top economiser and pump refrigerant that uses the outside air to cool the facility without having
w w w.di gi t a l re a lt y. a s ia
to bring the outside area into the facility.
sort of Virginia-Dallas DSE units,
“We’re the only company in Australia
whereas in Europe we use an indirect
that I’m aware of that’s using the BSE
adiabatic solution because it’s got
system and we pioneered that with
a cooler climate.”
Vertiv in the United States for our US
Indirect adiabatic is essentially
systems. We’ve applied it in Australia
a cooling system that relies more on
because it’s a very good climate for
water than it does power. In European
us so we’re getting low PUEs across
regions such as Dublin, for example,
construction, high reliability with the BSE
where you’ve got the maximum temp-
system and just overall energy efficiency.
eratures of 30 degrees, you’re able
“The major variable with technology
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to use that with much less energy.
is generally cooling equipment based
“In Australia, we need to have provi-
on different climates around the world.
sions for the 45-46 degree days that
In Sydney, we’ve gone with the US-style
we have every now and again,” he adds.
“ In Sydney, we’ve gone with the US-style sort of Virginia-Dallas DSE units, whereas in Europe we use an indirect adiabatic solution because it’s got a cooler climate” — Daniel Howard, Director of Construction, Digital Reality
“We need equipment that will accommodate for that but also when it’s not 45 degrees it’s still very efficient, and that’s where the BSE system has come into play.” Digital Realty has also just secured land for the construction of another two-story building nearby (Sydney) of around 16,000 square metres which will go through the planning approval process in tandem with fitting-out the remainder of SYD11 so there is another facility ready to go as soon as that capacity is leased-out. 11
E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Daniel Howard
E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Howard from a construction background, which is a bit different, as in Name isHere the data centre world, many mechanical-electrical engineers Approx 100 words quam aut aut eaturi sequi quiasit, qui come from adolupta consulting background. He acienimi, actually built theconem SYD10 quo facility for the builder cusdand enistium offici before intocone the client side role, Sundant which is as unique in de the industry. blaudimoving occumqui laborep ratur? rempe “I’m sure I’m sequo not theomnisitem first one that’s a construction backvoluptu ribus, laut acome dolutfrom occulparum ground to do that,” he says, “butende coming from a concrete hillant quibus mi, voloreprovit deres aliandit harit, and steel background to con electrical equipment, power factors, kilonet, offic temperro experat. Cum faccum quati officiet watt cooling BSE unitsfaccum has been of a transformation.” peresti ncitiaand in restrum quoa bit el illuptam dolupta Howardalitaquo is an expert in thevellant. delivery complex Data erempor tem secae Ta of quid qui veliqui Centre Projects to meet the demanding requirements of nobitius diti atibusa consediossit evel ius des qui con ped modern data totatust centres, dis with experience in Project Managequam, sedit, nonsequ aepernam fugiti conestoment, Design Construction Management and tas everes id Management, ut autem et moluptius. Igenis soloribus accate Property Development. sendit, que nos et que ebit et omnih.
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“It’s good to be in a position where as soon as we’re finishing one building, we’re thinking and acquiring land for the next,” adds Howard. “The key
$2.475bn Approximate revenue
thing about Erskine Park is that there are probably three hubs in Sydney at the moment. “You’ve got one hub in and around the airport where a lot of the sub-sea cables are landing, which have the connections to the rest of the globe up to Singapore and Guam and over to the US and New Zealand. “The next hub is probably the Macquar12
2004
Year founded
1,436
Approximate number of employees
ie Park area, and then, the last hub is out in the Erskine Park Eastern Creek area. The major attraction to that area is the ability to do large scale because of the power availability in that area.” There are multiple data centres within the area, so it’s carrier-rich, with lots of
“We’re looking for sites that are around
communications cabling around the
two to four times the size of our existing
area, and the Western Sydney Bulk
sites,” he adds. “We’re now looking at
Supply Point Substation – a 1500 MVA
six to 10-hectare sites; that’s just an
transmission station – is connected
indication of which way we’re going.”
directly to the power station. Next on the construction agenda for
“In Osaka, we’re working on developing the next 70 megawatts of IT load
Digital Realty is doubling the APAC
for our clients and the market. We’re
footprint, with the new space in Sydney,
also undergoing a process of procuring
land in Melbourne and acquiring more
renewable energy and that’s where the
space in Singapore, Osaka and Tokyo.
data centres have the biggest impact
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with regards to energy consumption.” Howard, who was the project manager
“It’s very important that the contractor relationship ensures that the people
for the general contractor client side
who are doing the work are aligned
and organised all the steel and trades
with what you’re trying to achieve.”
for the first three Sydney facilities, will be overseeing all the builds. He’s worked with all the vendors at a direct level, as well as being the one step away from it, and says “It’s a good thing because we’ve got a very good relationship with the contractors. w w w.di gi t a l re a lt y. a s ia
Level 17, 111 Pacific Highway, North Sydney, 2060 T +61 2 9834 0114 digitalrealty.asia