9 / 80
9
WWW.7X24EXCHANGE.ORGEducation Center adjacent to the
hospital’s main campus. The new
building, which can withstand a
Category 5 tornado, includes a new
server room and data center, a
customized standby power
generation system, the IT
department, administrative offices
and a clinical research area.
“When designing the Tech and Ed
Center, we put a lot of thought into
energy efficiency. We looked at
power systems, chill beams, rack
coolers, heat pumps and other
features, but we also implemented
ways to recover as much of that
energy as we could,” explained
Johanson. “We’re using the waste
heat from IT to heat the building,
which cuts energy load
tremendously. It’s working better
than expected as it only costs 40
percent of what it takes to heat the
main campus.”
The new facility is built with a variety
of energy efficiencies to help cut
costs, improve sustainability and
reduce environmental impact. In fact,
the new building costs $1.48 per
square foot in energy each year
compared to $2.84 per square foot
at the main campus. To achieve this,
the hospital implemented an
effective energy strategy.
ENERGY EFFICIENCIES
The latest industry trends indicate
system efficiency is the top priority
when it comes to building data
centers. Companies are applying
energy-conscious design strategies
to eliminate as much waste as
possible. No detail is too small as
building materials, storage
components, heating, use of space,
maintenance needs, security, wire
routing, cooling systems, piping and
even elevators are thoroughly
considered.
CHI St. Alexius Health worked with
the local Cat
®
dealer, Butler
Machinery, to design a customized
backup power system including six
Cat C15 500 kW standby diesel
generator sets with Cat Engine
Paralleling and Integration Controls
(EPIC), and two Cat Flywheel
Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS).
Three custom enclosures were
designed with two generator sets
each, arranged side by side, to
overcome space constraints and
ease of maintenance concerns.
“A reliable standby power system is
crucial to CHI St. Alexius Health. It
serves our administrative offices,
financial department and most
importantly, our data center,”
explained Johanson. “We worked
closely with Butler Machinery to
design a fully integrated system, and
we ended up with an intricate setup
that utilizes multiple flywheels,
several generator sets, and an A and
B electrical feed, so we’re never
without power.”
Butler Machinery aligned with the
long-term vision at the hospital by
providing a cost-effective solution
that maintains quality. Capable of
accepting 100 percent rated load in
a single step, the C15 engines offer
proven performance and optimized
fuel economy. The remote-mounted
EPIC system eliminates the need for
traditional hard-wired components
and manages the generator sets
while seamlessly directing power
through the distribution switchgear.
Providing constant power protection,
the flywheel UPS insulates the
generator sets from transient and
block loads, and provides operating
efficiencies that exceed traditional
battery-type UPS.
Beyond the power system, the
hospital also incorporated advanced
energy efficiencies into the
Technology and Education Center
infrastructure. These features
include:
• GEOTHERMAL SYSTEM
– Heat
generated by the data center is
used to heat the building with a
geothermal recovery design. A
pump pulls water from 302
underground wells, which flows
through pipes around the building.
Waste heat from the data center
increases the water temperature
and then distributes warmth to
other parts of the building. The
process is reversed in the summer
to cool the facility, making it a very
efficient and cost-effective feature.
• CHILLED BEAMS
– Heat/cool coil
units, or chilled beams, take
outside air with recovery reels to
regulate temperature in the
building. Only one air handling unit
is required to support the new
facility compared to the 13 units
needed to manage the main
campus, thus reducing duct work,
We’re not looking
10 or 20 years
down the road.
We’re planning for
the next 100 years,
which is reflected
in the way
we designed...