SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR DYNAMICALLY MODELING DATA CENTER PARTITIONS

• US 20100082309A1
• Filed: 09/29/2008
• Published: 04/01/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/29/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Kyndryl Incorporated
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Kendzierski, Michael D., Hamilton, Rick A. II, Diluoffo, Vincenzo V., DAWSON, Christopher J.
• Granted Patent: US 9,250,663 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 703/6
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/20 Cooling means
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/206 comprising thermal management
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 30/13 Architectural design, e.g. computer-aided architectural design [CAAD] related to design of buildings, bridges, landscapes, production plants or roads
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 7/20836 Thermal management, e.g. server temperature control
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

A method implemented in a computer infrastructure having computer executable code tangibly embodied on a computer readable medium having programming instructions operable to perform a thermal analysis of a data center and overlay the thermal analysis on a map of the data center to provide an overlaid thermal analysis. Additionally, the programming instructions are operable to receive a user selection of at least one modeled partition location based on the overlaid thermal analysis and dynamically model a modeled partition for each of the at least one modeled partition location in the data center to create a modeled data center region.

Claims

1. A method implemented in a computer infrastructure comprising computer executable code tangibly embodied on a computer readable medium having programming instructions operable to:

perform a thermal analysis of a data center;

overlay the thermal analysis on a map of the data center to provide an overlaid thermal analysis;

receive a user selection of at least one modeled partition location based on the overlaid thermal analysis; and

dynamically model a modeled partition for each of the at least one modeled partition location in the data center to create a modeled data center region.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the programming instructions are further operable to dynamically model a heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) system based on the overlaid thermal analysis and the at least one modeled partition location to provide a desired temperature in the model data center region.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the dynamically modeling the HVAC system comprises modeling at least one HVAC system parameter.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the at least one HVAC system parameter comprises:

a number of air conditioning units;

an amount of air conditioning tonnage;

a partition material R value;

a ceiling tile R value;

a floor R value;

an HVAC air flow rate;

an HVAC air flow temperature;

a number of diffusers;

a degree of opening of the diffusers;

a placement of the diffusers; and

a diffuser orientation.

5. The method of claim 2, further comprising updating at least one of the performing, the overlaying, the receiving and the modeling after a predetermined time has expired.

6. The method of claim 2, further comprising updating at least one of the performing, the overlaying, the receiving and the modeling upon the occurrence of a triggering event or a manual direction.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the triggering event comprises at least one of:

a temperature change in the data center beyond a predetermined threshold; and

a computational resource usage change in the data center.

8. The method of claim 2, wherein the dynamically modeling the HVAC system comprises:

calculating a volume of the modeled data center region;

determining the desired temperature of the modeled data center region; and

modeling at least one HVAC parameter so that cooling provided by the HVAC system for the volume counteracts heat generated by computing resources in the modeled data center region and maintains the modeled data center region at the desired temperature.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the modeled partition comprises at least one of a modeled wall partition, a modeled ceiling partition and a modeled floor partition composed of a thermally insulative material.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the modeled data center region segregates at least one of:

a hotter area of the data center from a cooler area of the data center; and

an area of the data center where a job is scheduled from an area of the data center not being utilized.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the performing the thermal analysis comprises:

receiving real-time temperature readings from at least one environmental sensor in the data center; and

at least one of;

determining average temperatures for regions of the data center based on the real-time temperature readings; and

determining air flow paths in the data center.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the map of the data center comprises at least one of:

a physical layout of computing resources of the data center;

an indication of a portion of the computing resources that is to be maintained in a cool environment and an indication of a portion of the computing resources that is to operate in higher temperature environments; and

a real-time indication of the computing resources that are currently operating.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein a service provider at least one of creates, maintains, deploys and supports the computer infrastructure that performs the steps of claim 1.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein steps of claim 1 are provided by a service provider on a subscription, advertising, and/or fee basis.

15. A system, comprising:

a thermal analysis tool configured to perform a thermal analysis of a data center;

a mapping tool configured to overlay the thermal analysis over a map of the data center to provide an overlaid thermal analysis; and

a partition and heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) modeling tool configured to;

receive a user selection of at least one modeled partition location based on the overlaid thermal analysis; and

dynamically model a partition for each of the at least one modeled partition location in the data center to create a modeled data center region.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the partition and HVAC modeling tool is further configured to model an HVAC system based on the overlaid thermal analysis to provide a desired temperature in the modeled data center region.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the modeling the HVAC system comprises modeling at least one HVAC system parameter.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the at least one HVAC system parameter comprises:

a number of air conditioning units;

an amount of air conditioning tonnage;

a partition material R value;

a ceiling tile R value;

a floor R value;

an HVAC air flow rate;

an HVAC air flow temperature;

a number of diffusers;

a degree of opening of the diffusers;

a placement of the diffusers; and

a diffuser orientation.

19. The system of claim 16, wherein the partition and HVAC modeling tool is further configured to:

calculate a volume of the modeled data center region;

determine the desired temperature of the modeled data center region; and

model at least one HVAC system parameter so that cooling provided by the HVAC system for the volume counteracts heat generated by computing resources in the modeled data center region and maintains the modeled data center region at the desired temperature.

20. The system of claim 15, wherein the modeled partition comprises one of a modeled wall partition, a modeled ceiling partition and a modeled floor partition composed of a thermally insulative material.

21. The system of claim 15, wherein the modeled data center region segregates at least one of:

a hotter area of the data center from a cooler area of the data center; and

an area of the data center where a job is scheduled from an area of the data center not being utilized.

22. The system of claim 15, comprising a computer infrastructure operable to implement the thermal analysis tool, the mapping tool, and the partition and HVAC modeling tool, wherein a service provider at least one of creates, maintains, deploys and supports the computer infrastructure.

23. The system of claim 15, wherein the system is operable on software, hardware or a combination of software and hardware.

24. A computer program product comprising a computer usable medium having readable program code embodied in the medium, the computer program product includes at least one component operable to:

perform a thermal analysis of a data center by receiving real-time temperature readings from at least one environmental sensor in the data center; and

at least one of;

determine average temperatures for regions of the data center based on the real-time temperature readings; and

determine air flow paths in the data center;

overlay the thermal analysis on a map of the data center to provide an overlaid thermal analysis;

receive a user selection of at least one modeled partition location based on the overlaid thermal analysis; and

dynamically model a modeled partition for each of the at least one modeled partition location in the data center to create a modeled data center region; and

dynamically model an HVAC system based on the overlaid thermal analysis and the at least one modeled partition location to provide a desired temperature in the modeled data center region.

25. A method comprising:

providing a computer infrastructure operable to;

perform a thermal analysis of a data center to identify cooler regions of the data center and hotter regions of the data center;

overlay the thermal analysis on a map of the data center to provide an overlaid thermal analysis which correlates the cooler regions of the data center and the hotter regions of the data center with computational resources of the data center;

receive a user selection of at least one modeled partition location based on the overlaid thermal analysis;

dynamically model a modeled partition for each of the at least one modeled partition location in the data center to create a modeled data center region; and

dynamically model an HVAC system based on the overlaid thermal analysis and the at least one modeled partition location to provide a desired temperature in the modeled data center region.