Rackspace has opened a new 130,000 sq ft data centre at Crawley, West Sussex, to cater to its customers across the UK and Europe.
Rackspace teamed up with data centre and colocation provider Digital Realty to build the energy efficient data centre.
According to Rackspace, the data centre is capable of providing Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) of 1.15, which is more than the 1.7 rating achieved by average data centres.
Having achieved BREEAM assessment certification of ‘Excellent’, the data centre is one of greenest data centres, and is claimed to be the first in the UK to ditch mechanical cooling for the new ‘indirect outside air’ cooling technology on a large scale.
With indirect outside air cooling technology, Crawley data centre’s overhead energy required for operation has been cut by nearly 80%
Spread across a 15-acre site, the data centre is capable of holding up to 50,000 physical servers.
It presently has 6MW capacity across two data suites, which the company plans to expand to 12MW across four data suites.
For security, Rackspace has used physical perimeter fence through to personnel badge readers along with fingerprint biometrics scanners, which will scan the fingerprints of individuals before they enter sensitive areas.
Rackspace COO Mark Roenigk said: "This is our tenth global data centre and this expansion will enable us to grow with our customers for many years to come.
"We are proud of the energy efficiency achieved with the innovative design that will become the starting point for boosting the adoption of more efficient technologies in the UK and Europe."
