Guardian iT has announced it will install an on-site power plant in its new Internet hotel.
The growth of the Internet has already caused the electricity supply network in California to come under huge strain. Learning from this, UK web hosts are looking to alternative forms of power supply to prevent a similar outcome. Guardian iT’s decision to install a 24MW on-site power plant at Europe’s largest ‘Internet hotel’ is a sign that across Europe and the US, electricity companies are unable to guarantee power to acceptable levels of reliability for such large sites. Guardian iT needed its supplies within six months, but local utility Scottish & Southern could only offer guaranteed power in 18 months.
More than 200 hotels, which contain servers to run companies’ websites and eCommerce services, will be built across Europe in the next four years, requiring around 3GW of generating capacity. A reliable suppy of power is crucial, but most power plants can only offer 95% availability in any specific year – they needing to be taken down for three weeks a year for maintenance. This means that for any given power demand, twice the capacity must be installed, half for generation and half for backup.
This level of investment in power generation can easily double the cost of an Internet hotel, although admittedly on-site generation, and the use of co-generation to provide direct cooling of servers rather than electrical cooling, will save on power bills. Nonetheless, on-site power is a headache that Internet hotels could do without – after all, they’re not engineering companies.
An interim option which all would do well to consider is to rent generating capacity that can ‘buy time’ whilst waiting for a utility to guarantee supplies. Firms could also rent backup systems and then purchase them once utility supplies are in place.
