Data Center Utility Cost Management

Los Alamos National Laboratory Engineering, 2013-14

Liaison(s): Dr. Josip Loncaric, Alynna Montoya-Wiuff, Amanda Bonnie, Michael Ferguson, Parks Fields, Cindy Martin
Advisor(s): Philip Cha
Students(s): Alexandra Wright (TL-S), Maya Johnson (TL-F), Carolina Reyes, Tamara Savage (S), Ryan Seldon (S), Ariel Willey (F)

The Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) Clinic Team designed a strategy to reduce operating cost and environmental impact of the LANL supercomputing data center by minimizing water and energy consumption. The team created a thermodynamic model of the cooling system, identified and optimized the key parameters, and evaluated this strategy against a fixed-setpoint temperature approach. The strategy capitalizes on the wide range of Los Alamos, NM weather conditions by operating the system at settings optimized for ambient temperatures.