Mission Critical Power

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ISSUE 6: August 2016

12

DCs and the EU: A sorry tale that would have ended worse with us in?

22

Management crisis: Esos highlights energy management gap

24

Learn about maximising returns from existing assets and operations

3

IN THIS ISSUE

10

22 Energy

Efficiency What has Esos achieved?

If nothing else, it has proven that basic energy management is absent in even the largest firms

Insight Brexit: What will the UK’s decision to leave the EU mean for utility costs in the future?

24 Demand-side Response Those that can access the flexibility in their assets and operations will insulate themselves from volatility and rising costs

12 Viewpoint Ian Bitterlin comments on why Brexit may well be a good thing for the UK and data centre operators with a mind on energy and cost savings

28

missioncriticalpower.uk

ISSUE 6: August 2016

12

DCs and the EU: A sorry tale that would have ended worse with us ‘in’

22

Management crisis: Esos highlights energy management gap

24

Learn about maximising returns from existing assets and operations

Modular Solutions An instantly deployable turnkey cloud data centre in a container

26 14

Power Storage

Cover Story

Optimise your energy strategy and lower the costs of running the building with the advances in storage technology

Schneider Electric talks about transforming uninterruptible power in future data centres

Comment

6

Energy Efficiency

16

Cooling & Air Movement

30

News

8

Demand-side Response

24

DC Infrastructure

34

Insight

10

Energy Storage

26

Products

38

Viewpoint

12

Modular Solutions

28

Q&A

42

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August 2016 MCP

8

NEWS & COMMENT

National Grid warns UK will miss 2020 targets but predicts big battery future Table 1: Levels of storage connected in 2040 (GW) Transmissionconnected

Distributionconnected

Sub-1MW

Total

5.9

3.8

1.7

11.4

Gone green Slow progression

3.9

2.3

0.2

6.4

No progression

3.0

0.5

0.1

3.6

Consumer power

4.1

13.2

1.0

18.3

Source: National Grid Future Energy Scenarios

Table 2: Lithium-ion battery cell costs 1,200 1,000

US$/kWh

Lack of progress in decarbonising heat and transport will see the UK miss its 2020 renewable energy targets, according to system operator National Grid.

The company published its latest Future Energy Scenarios in July. Under the most optimistic scenario, the target of 15% of energy from renewable sources will be met in 2022. Under the least optimistic scenario, that target will be reached in 2029.

National Grid said gas would continue to play a major role in power generation for the foreseeable future, with shale gas production potentially ramping up from 2021. It also stated that gas will continue to be the predominant form of domestic heating, with 70% of homes continuing to use gas as a primary heat source in 2030.

Meanwhile, National Grid sees potential for up to 18GW of electricity storage,

800 600 400 200 0 2010 Forecasted prices

2015

2020

2025

2030

Historic average

mainly batteries, by 2040, most of which is connected to the distribution network.

Within the next 10 years, the system operator also sees the maximum contribution from

demand-side response standing at 5.7GW. In the short term, National Grid said it would review its current set of schemes to allow storage providers to offer bundled services. That review is scheduled to commence in autumn 2016.

According to its predictions, National Grid expects Lithiumion battery cell costs to halve in the next three years, from about US$400/kWh (£300/ kWh) to $200kWh (£150/ kWh) by 2019.

Government, Ofgem and National Grid must make battery storage stack up, urges lobby group Scottish Renewables has warned that battery storage will remain hamstrung unless National Grid, Ofgem and government make the changes outlined in its new report, The lobby group called for National Grid to be allowed by Ofgem to give longer contracts to providers of flexibility services and to set out how and when Triads – the transmissions system peak charging methodology – will change. Adding just one year to enhanced frequency response (EFR) contracts (currently four years) would make a positive impact, argues the report.

The system operator should also better align its tenders for various flexibility services to enable storage developers to ‘stack’ several revenue streams together, thereby making battery storage a more attractive prospect to investors.

The report also calls for policymakers to explore a ‘cap and floor’ regime for developers of larger battery storage projects. This regulatory model essentially limits their exposure to up- and downsides of investment –

MCP August 2016

but also sets a ceiling on revenues.

Meanwhile, Scottish Renewables urged Decc and Ofgem to stick to the timelines set out by the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) in clarifying the legal and regulatory status of storage within the electricity market. Storage is currently classified both as generation and as storage, meaning it is subject to double charging.

The NIC wants that cleared up by next spring.

Because battery storage can play a significant role in balancing distribution networks, the report also urges Ofgem to look at the way DNOs are incentivised for using batteries and storage more innovatively. Ofgem has set up funding schemes for DNOs in this regard but the knowledge is not always shared as well as it should be with the wider market. If DNOs can create new revenue streams for battery storage operators to work into their ’stacks’, investment will follow, reasons Scottish Renewables.

The report also sets out 14 potential revenue streams for battery storage operators and how these might interact, spanning transmission system balancing services through voltage optimisation and black start to arbitrage.

missioncriticalpower.uk

9

Decc abolished as Greg Clark appointed head of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy The Prime Minister’s Office has confirmed that the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc) is to be abolished. Responsibility for energy policy will now be the remit of an expanded business department.

Greg Clark, former head of the Department for Communities and Local Government, is the new secretary of state for the

Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS).

The news was expected following former energy minister (turned new Defra secretary of state) Andrea Leadsom’s refusal to rule out the department’s closure at Decc Orals last month.

Many observers were surprised that the department survived the last general

election. Decc was seen by industry as under resourced, given the scale of its task. Its image within Whitehall had suffered due to successive energy secretaries and ministers overseeing perceived failures in large project delivery.

The most recent Decc secretary of state, Amber Rudd, has been made home secretary following the reshuffle.

BEIS secretary Greg Clark

Ofgem: Power flexibility will become more important than energy efficiency The value of flexibility within the power system could increase tenfold over the coming years, according to Ofgem’s Andrew Wright. The regulator’s senior partner for energy systems believes flexibility will ultimately become more valuable than energy efficiency within the energy system.

Speaking at National Grid’s Power Responsive conference, Wright said that the “real value is in [businesses’] flexibility. That value is going to increase, maybe by an order of magnitude.”

Failing to capitalise on

flexibility would require step changes in technology to decarbonise the power system, Wright suggested. “Without flexibility, you have to hope we can crack carbon capture and storage,” he said. “If we can’t, you wonder where cheap flexibility is going to come from.”

However, he acknowledged commercial challenges within demand-side response markets.

“There are a lot of parallels with energy efficiency. You are asking people to invest in something that has uncertain value going forward.” But

he said that, as with energy efficiency, flexible power consumption would become the norm.

“Today, you wouldn’t dream of building a supermarket without thinking about energy efficiency,” said Wright.

Flexibility, he added, would follow the same path to maturity “and [ultimately] become more valuable than energy efficiency”.

He said Ofgem would work to help enable the “marketisation” of flexibility and try to create a level playing field for providers, but warned those looking

to exploit current charging arrangements that the gravy train may soon be coming to halt.

The government has called a review of so-called embedded benefits, which some market participants believe are overly generous to small generators, creating market distortions.

While Ofgem has not yet made any specific recommendations, “[developers] should not be siting generation [on the distribution network] purely to exploit distortions in charging arrangements”, said Wright.

Enterprises can directly connect to DDoS detection Equinix has announced that F5 Networks has joined its Cloud Exchange to provide direct, scalable and reliable access to its F5 Silverline cloud-based DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) protection solution.

By joining the Cloud Exchange, F5 enables enterprise customers in each of these markets to seamlessly access 'scrubbed' data in a low-latency, secure and scalable environment.

DDoS attacks are increasing in scale and complexity, and are not expected to slow down any time

missioncriticalpower.uk

soon. To prevent these attacks from reaching the enterprise network, organisations need a hybrid solution for cloud-based mitigation in addition to on-premises protection.

In fact, in a recent report by F5, The State of Application Delivery, 81% of respondents cited plans to move toward hybrid cloud environments to leverage the flexibility and potential cost savings it offers.

F5 is working with Equinix to ensure that its customers have the ability to create a hybrid defence solution in a secure and highperformance environment while

also providing the ability to create a multi-cloud deployment model.

Equinix vice-president of interconnection solutions Bill Long said: “CIOs today are continually faced with network and application security concerns. With F5's blend of both on-premise infrastructure and cloud-based security solutions, CIOs can feel confident that their information is secure. By leveraging Equinix Cloud Exchange, F5 is changing the way that security services are delivered enabling a cloud solution without sacrificing security or performance.”

August 2016 MCP

10

INSIGHT

Brexit downturn could push up energy bills; big capacity market hikes ‘unlikely’ to build new gas What will the UK’s decision to leave the EU mean for utility costs in the future?

Brendan Coyne reports

A

fall in energy demand as a result of a Brexit-related economic downturn will see businesses paying more for their energy.

Meanwhile, even a 150% increase in capacity market payments, which will weigh heavy on bills, may not be enough to incentivise new gas plants, according to Cornwall Energy.

Managing director Jo Butlin said that while the consultancy did not expect “huge changes” in wholesale energy costs over the short term, longer-term affects may be material, given the UK imports about half of its fuel and the impact of Brexit on Sterling.

However, wholesale costs now represent only half of energy bills. The remainder comes from network charges, subsidies and levies, which are spread across power users.

“If there is a downturn, and a reduction in demand, we are likely to see bills going the other way – and that is a difficult situation for consumers,” she warned.

Cornwall Energy has also revised up its outturn estimate for the T-4 (winter 2020-21) capacity auction to £49/kW,

MCP August 2016

If there is a downturn, and a reduction in demand, we are likely to see bills going the other way – and that is a difficult situation for consumers missioncriticalpower.uk

11

about two and a half times the outturn of the first T-4 auction.

However, the consultancy remains skeptical whether even that kind of increase, which would add £364m to energy bills, will be sufficient to incentives investors in largescale gas generation Peter Atherton, the firm’s new associate, said £49/kW “sounds a little bit low” for investors.

“They are willing to take some kind of exposure to wholesale markets, but in today’s world, with today’s policies, they will want [the capacity mechanism] to cover 85%-90% of their economics.

Will £49/kW get them there?

It sounds a little bit low,” he said. “But it’s not a million miles away.”

Post-Brexit however, the government may no longer have to try and incentivise new

£49/kW Cornwall Energy’s revised outturn estimate for the T-4 (winter 2020-21) capacity auction

gas under the straightjacket of State Aid rules. It may now simply devise a contract for difference (CfD) for gas, according to the consultancy.

As the Department of Energy and Climate Change is subsumed into an expanded business department, Atherton urged policymakers to take stock of the policy landscape and take the opportunity “to stop doing stupid things”.

However, he said current market chatter suggests that it will plough on with

Hinkley C and the smart meter programme. “It doesn’t look like we are going to see much change [on nuclear and smart meters], at least as far as this particular parliament is concerned,” he said.

Since the government agreed the strike price with EDF for its new reactor at Hinkley Point, the cost to consumers has risen from £6bn to almost £30bn, according to the National Audit Office, due to its guarantee to make up the difference between the wholesale market price and the guaranteed ‘strike price’ against a backdrop of declining prices.

Atherton has previously described the contract as “an abomination that will blow up in the nation’s face”. However, he said the French-owned firm was likely by the end of July to make a commitment to build the project. l

The implications for UK’s climate change policies According to Cornwall Energy, Brexit will make little impact on the UK’s climate goals in the medium term.

“The pathway we are on to decarbonise electricity [out to 2050] is enshrined in legislation via the Climate Change Act 2008,” Peter Atherton said. Moreover, support for climate change goals from Labour, Liberal, SNP and a significant minority of Conservative MPs mean that “even if the new prime minister wanted to repeal or significantly amend the Climate Change Act, there isn’t room [in parliament] to do that,” he added.

However, Brexit will likely push up the cost of capital for energy projects as financial institutions price in a perceived increase in political risk, said Atherton.

But Atherton, a utilities investment analyst for two decades, said capital markets would still pile into energy projects if government could produce a reasonably stable set of policies.

The key thing to understand about capital markets is that globally there is an absolute shortage of yields. There are tens of trillions of dollars out there in negative yields,” said Atherton. “Global capital markets will be happy to invest if confident in the sustainability of government policy. Yield is the absolute key in the capital markets and has been in the last 15-20 years.” missioncriticalpower.uk

August 2016 MCP

12

VIEWPOINT

I voted for Brexit. Here’s why…

Ian Bitterlin comments on why Brexit may well be a good thing for the UK and data centre opertors with a mind on energy and cost savings

B

efore I get to the datacentre reasons I might as well fess-up as to all of the other reasons why I voted to ‘leave’. First of all, it was the first time I had voted in any election for more than 40 years, something, given the huge turnout for the referendum, I clearly shared with a lot of people.

In fact, there is a link connecting my usual apathy with my keenness to vote this time – I have a very low regard of politicians of every persuasion, gender, creed, religion or nationality. For me, the professional civil service runs the country well enough and a marginal majority in the House of Commons prevents the government of the day from doing too much harm. Let me point out, before you think that I am wasting the franchise that so many people died to give us, that no matter how I had voted since the early 1970s there would have been no change in my MP’s affiliation.

Hardly democatic Our lack of proportional representation means that 25% of the electorate can and does elect a government with a healthy majority. Hardly democracy. The 39% of the electorate that voted to leave (more people voted to leave than have ever voted for anything else before) would produce a landslide the likes of which we will never see.

I certainly didn’t vote ‘leave’ because of immigration (my father was an immigrant) or any anti-European feelings, since I revel in our social and historical diversity and most of my friends are not British. No, I voted so I could show what I thought about UK and EU politicians warning us that we would be stupid to vote leave. I voted to protect

MCP August 2016

But what about datacentres and the EU? Well that’s a sorry tale that would have ended worse with us ‘in’ as ‘out’ what democracy we have, to avoid an EU Federal State and Armed Force and to object to the excesses, waste and gravytrain in the EU institutions. And when the CEOs of two German conglomerates tried to frighten us off I think that it contributed to tipping the balance at the last minute. As for the single market – we are the fifth largest economy in the world and we buy far more goods ‘in’ than we manufacture and sell ‘out’ – they will be queuing up to sign trade deals with us, not the other way around. We had a single market before the EU, called EFTA, and that worked just fine.

If you want to be cynical you

could explain my vote as simply a combination of my age, gender, ethnicity and the fact I don’t live in London. But what about datacentres and the EU? Well that’s a sorry tale that would have ended worse with us ‘in’ as ‘out’.

Having spent a lot of time in and around the offices of the Commission I have always been frustrated by the same background noise: ignorance. When the EU wants to do something it appoints a consulting firm to write it a paper and then, more often than not, gathers industry in and shows them the report. It is, as you would expect, not an expert piece as the consultants rarely know the industry they are asked to report on. They then ask for industry input for one/two days while the chosen consultants (often staffed with bright young things straight from a Masters programme having bypassed a real-world job) scribble away. A few months later the ‘final draft’ is published and the industrial invitees are called together again to witness the birth. Hey presto! A poor job done at great tax-payer expense. The

latest was an energy efficiency improvement document for data centres, which started off with the invited audience asking why the consultants hadn’t even referred to the EU’s own Codeof-Conduct. They hadn’t even heard of it.

A waste of money Then came along the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) designed to record and tax carbon emissions from small power stations or businesses self-generating. Noble, yes. Well applied, absolutely (stupidly) not. The EU put all generators (over about 7MW capacity per business entity) into the scheme even if they were standby emergency sets. This means that a data centre business may have to spend £30,000 per year in administering the reporting via a consultant and pay £1,000 in tax as a result. Same applies to a large hospital. No amount of objection worked, in fact they virtually refused to discuss changing it.

But the waste of taxpayers’ money on data centre-related ‘research’ has a much longer history. It goes way back and missioncriticalpower.uk

13 includes the grants emanating from the EU FP series of funding – ie FP6, and the last round FP7. FP7 is spending ¤50bn on research projects and the EU has spent multimillions of those euros on such projects as GAMES, FIT4Green, All4Green, CoolEmAll, GEYSER – even PEDCA and Eureka, which have been centred on UK co-funded groups.

Why do I call it a waste?

Well, with the jury still out on PEDCA (a study of training and skills required run by our own DCA) and Eureka (smart city integration of data centres focussed at UoEL) the rest have been paid for, finished, printed and put on a shelf to collect dust. They will never see the light of day and only exist in the memories of their authors in terms of a meal ticket for a couple of years. Much of the research funds are spent on travel and accommodation when attending conferences.

Ill-conceived research No doubt that research should not only be regarded as a success if it finds a solution to something but many of these projects have been ill-conceived with obvious and predictable results. One, for example, explored the possibility of matching data centre load with the availability of intermittent renewable energy, like wind. It seriously brought into the arena of social networking like Facebook what amounted to batchprocessing. So, when the youth of tomorrow opens Facebook a message may pop-up saying ‘come back later when the wind is blowing’. Now, don’t get me wrong, that is not a bad idea but it takes two minutes to think about (and probably reject as political suicide) and should not involve a couple of million euros spent over two years by several people.

The same with the reuse of waste heat. Clearly a great idea in small embedded data centres of the future and technically no problem once you decide to go fluid-cooled. Most large city centre residential and hospital/ elderly care buildings can absorb 100-200kW of hot water at 65°C on almost continuous basis. missioncriticalpower.uk

Again – quick to propose, easy to implement using technology already available and few hours of work to write a decent white paper on the subject, but a million or so euros and two to three years for a consortium of several companies/universities?

No, it is akin to robbery (without menaces) from an ignorant bureaucratic organisation that should either employ its own staff or stick to politicking and filling in expenses forms.

Then the whole issue of renewable energy for ICT – the focus of so much research money under many guises. The EU is obsessed with the idea that ICT should be renewably powered.

Even when faced with the question in public ‘why should tap-dancing dogs (YouTube) be renewably powered over a hospital?’ it continue to voice that ICT should be a modern exemplar for all industries. I even tried to compare ‘pornography over income-tax collection’ but to

centre-related point is that of energy reduction regardless of the criticality of the load. I have been in open discussion in Brussels trying to make the case that PUE should be related to the data centre business model.

In other words, Google might be 1.12 but a bank might not be prepared to go as far down as 1.3 as it involves ‘risk’, either real or perceived, to the availability of digital services. In addition, let’s not forget that a bank’s energy cost in its data centre may be as much as 0.01% of its turnover – turnover that is driven entirely by the digital services provided by the data centre. Those numbers drive behaviour and I have found much resistance in Brussels to even acknowledge that a PUE target is not practical unless business is put first.

During that discussion (in 2014), I was made aware of the sort of agenda that would have arisen if we were to have remained. There is no point

education. Telling them that their 20MBs digital access agenda is driving the power consumption they are trying to reduce was not welcome – and trying to tell them who William Stanley Jevons (inventor among other things of the Jevons paradox – increases in energy production efficiency leads to more not less consumption) was fell on stony ground.

But the killer comment I heard involved ‘the London market’.

Thanks to my immigrant German-speaking father, I can listen well enough in German.

Thanks to my English mother, and growing up in the very early fifties when German was not a popular language in London, I speak only English. So, it has always been useful not to make it obvious that I am anything else than a typical Brit – when speaking to foreigners we just raise the volume. That’s when, on this occasion in 2014, I overheard a secretive discussion in German during a coffee break – that

Most large city centre residential and hospital/elderly care buildings can absorb 100-200kW of hot water at 65°C on almost continuous basis. Again – quick to propose, easy to implement using technology already available and few hours of work to write a decent white paper on the subjec, but a million or so euros and two to three years for a consortium of several companies/universities? no avail. Yes, of course, all energy should be renewable, but it is never going to happen without a nuclear base capacity or the collapse of Western society.

There is even one co-funded project that was set up to coordinate the others since most of the projects actually have the same core topic. That report should be worth reading.

The only project not funded (yet) is the one that would propose that phones can’t have integral cameras and that cameras could not be internet enabled. The drop in internet traffic (and power) would be near to 40%. There, one minute to type – where can I send the invoice for ¤100,000 of taxpayers’ cash?

The last frustrating data

pretending that we are liked.

We didn’t join the euro, we are outside Schengen and we like the Americans – what is there to like if you are a European federalist?

They don’t like the fact that 40-50% of Europe’s raised floor is in the UK since they feel it should be in the heart of Europe (although I have never worked out if Paris knows that that is Frankfurt). They are irritated by us when we tell them that no European equivalent to ASHRAE exists and Telecom Italia can’t rewrite the rules without the ICT industry involvement – and that would be TC9.9 of ASHRAE. They wouldn’t accept that it is not the data centres that are driving power consumption but the people – and not (back then at least) business or medicine or

the data centre power problem would be easier to solve once the main financial market was moved out of London and into Frankfurt.

So, it is not enough to allow us to be a buyer of goods rather than a manufacturer (and become an 85% service-based economy) but we also have to relinquish our finance, banking and trading business. Now we have to fight for it.

A last question: if all the other EU members had a leave/remain referendum how do you think the electorates would vote? I think that our result would be repeated in well over half of the member states. l Ian Bitterlin is a consulting engineer and visiting professor at Leeds University August 2016 MCP

14

COVER STORY

Transforming uninterruptible power in future data centres It was only a matter of time until Li-Ion reached the market for UPS, but how is this innovation driving the need for change? By Matthew Baynes, data centre business development director, Schneider Electric

W

ith prolonged life expectancy, reduced footprint, efficient cooling requirements, lighter weight and smaller size, Li-ion batteries are fast becoming the key to emerging UPS technologies.

Li-Ion addresses the need to reduce the footprint of traditional UPS tech such as valve-regulated lead-acid (VRLA) batteries, and secondly Li-Ion rapidly reduces the maintenance requirements or need for regular battery replacement in large-scale UPS topologies.

Companies deploying modular or adaptable integrated data centre architectures can greatly benefit from Li-Ion technology.

This is primarily because with such architectures, IT racks, power and cooling components are built and tested as part of an integrated solution, in which capacity can be incrementally expanded as

MCP August 2016

business requirements change over time Li-ion batteries enable integrated modular solutions to become even more space and energy-efficient. While they deliver the same benefits associated with having the UPS and battery protection close to the IT load, a strategy which provides an enhanced level of reliability and protection from any potential upstream electrical issues, they are easily scalable, allowing the data centre to adopt a pay-as-yougrow solution with flexible operating modes for a wide range of applications.

In addition to reducing space and meeting energy requirements, Li-ion batteries provide a lifecycle, which can be up to twice as long than their VRLA counterparts.

The technology requires less maintenance and is delivered with a sophisticated, integrated advanced battery monitoring systems (BMS), providing the user with simple, remote access point that delivers a reliable measure of UPS or ‘charge’ health.

Additionally, it also means that fewer people are required to visit the data centre facility to perform maintenance

rooms, and they won’t need replacing as regularly as VRLA batteries.

Put simply, large UPS systems utilising Li-ion batteries will provide all the benefits of static UPS technology while addressing all the disadvantages of traditional batteries, namely footprint, lifetime maintenance and cooling requirements.

Since we as an industry

Large UPS systems utilising Li-ion batteries will provide all the benefits of static UPS technology while addressing all the disadvantages of traditional batteries, namely footprint, lifetime maintenance and cooling requirements checks, which reduces the concerns raised through human element and can in some cases, mean an additional reduction in OPEX. In short, the chemistry utilised within Li-ion batteries makes them far more predictable to manage, making for easier, more effective maintenance.

With lighter weight and more compact cells, Li-Ion battery space requirements are a fraction of those needed for VRLA batteries. Essentially this provides a higher energy density, enabling an equivalent (or greater) runtime capability from a smaller space than traditional UPS battery systems. Li-Ion batteries also generate less heat, which requires a lower investment in cooling or special battery

are at the early stages of adoption, the benefits only stand to increase. It is expected that we will continue to see the performance of Li-Ion batteries improve, while costs are likely to reduce at a rapid pace. Meaning that the future requirements for high-powered, shorter backup times will likely be driven by Lithium-ion UPS technology and the market for static UPSs in large data centre applications, will become more competitive than ever.

Schneider Electric’s Galaxy VX UPS (pictured) will address efficiency issues in hyperscale data centres, providing a low TCO without compromising availability and reliability service level demands. schneider-electric.com missioncriticalpower.uk

16

ENERGY EFFICIENCY

UK’s largest firms share data to boost efficiency investment Energy efficiency business case data shared by some of the largest companies and organisations in the UK has been made public in a bid to drive uptake of demand reduction

MCP August 2016

2. This data sheds light on the significant “co-benefits” associated with energy projects. It finds on average three co-benefits per project, with maintenance and employee satisfaction benefits being most significant 3. Energy projects achieve high satisfaction ratings, which increase as projects move from assessed through to operational stages 4. Companies remain heavily reliant on internal cash to fund energy projects. Some 93% of the projects are selffunded Companies that have uploaded data span multiple sectors. They include BAE Systems, BT, Capgemini, Heathrow, Jaguar Land Rover, The Crown Estate, Toyota, Unilever, Walgreens Boots Alliance and WPP. Including overseas projects, there are some 650 project datasets now live on the platform, representing a

We estimate that over 40% of commercially attractive energy projects, which are largely synonymous with carbon reduction projects, are unrealised each year total project value of £510m.

While some companies may be reluctant to “give away IP” by sharing data in order to help others build business cases, there are mutual benefits to be gained: according to The Curve, one of the car manufacturers has used the data on the platform to triple its energy management budget.

Now the platform, which

is planning to spin-out and become a fully resourced business unit, wants other companies to share their data to help drive energy efficiency investment across the UK – and beyond.

According to The Crowd CEO Jim Woods, the incubator behind The Curve, the aim is to become “the TripAdvisor of energy management” in order to tackle what he sees as a market failure. “We estimate that over 40% of commercially attractive energy projects, which are largely synonymous with carbon reduction projects, are unrealised each year,” he said. “In the UK alone, that’s well over £1bn worth of missed investments.”

The Curve’s next aim is to add an algorithm to examine the company data that it holds and advise firms on projects that should work, giving them key information such as market return data, the best suppliers, and drawing conclusions from user comments. l

Figure 1: Paybacks by technology 10.0

160 No of projects

7.5

80

5.0 Average 2.5

40

Average payback

No of projects

Average payback 120

0

Be ha Tra vi n ou sp o r ch rt IT an O me ge ut a do su r M or es ot liv iv e ing D po em w er an In du d r BM st esp S ria o l p ns ro e ce En H ss er V gy M In m do O C an o th er ag r li em gh t Po en ing w t to Re e ne Re r q ols w frid ua ab g lit le er y a Bu ele tio ild ctr n Re in ic ne g ity w fab ab ri le c he at

T

he Curve platform aims to enable businesses to unlock energy efficiency investment by pooling project data across multiple business segments. Energy and sustainability managers can access and analyse the data to help build business cases for their own projects.

So far, 582 UK projects have been added to the platform, spanning insulation measures, to lighting, building management solutions, drives and controls, HVAC, renewable energy projects and demand-side response across multiple business sectors as well as the public sector.

The platform collects around 15 data points for each energy project, mainly on the business case, with the company name anonymised when it enters the visible database. The key data points are: site type, technology area (lighting, control, wind, transport etc), amount invested, the payback, a star rating for the project, comments and any recommended suppliers. This information then becomes available to everyone through the search capability, allowing people to see aggregate data and individual project data.

According to The Curve, initial analysis of the project data submitted so far shows that: 1. Energy management is an attractive investment class. The average payback, including 80 renewable energy generation projects, is 3.6 years. When the generation projects are removed, the average payback falls to 3.3 years. 64% of the non-generation projects pay back within three years

Source: The Curve

missioncriticalpower.uk

18

ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Energy Institute urges retrofits and equipment upgrades to make quickest efficiency gains Retrofitting existing building fabric will make the greatest energy efficiency gains during the next three years, according to the Energy Institute. Brendan Coyne reports

E

nergy Institute members believe technology and equipment upgrades have significant short-term potential, as do controls and smart systems.

However, they place little stock in electric heat pumps, smart appliances or renewable heat in either the near term or the long term.

By 2030, EI members believe new build standards will make the biggest impact on UK energy efficiency.

Those findings were published in the EI’s annual Energy Barometer, based on a survey of members.

“Energy efficiency in buildings can deliver results both in the short and longer term, if government acts now to set a policy framework that drives investor confidence, consumer demand for energy efficiency, and energy use and behaviour change,” said Dr Joanne Wade, chair of the EI’s Energy Advisory Panel, which oversaw the survey and report.

However, when asked what single measure government could take to meet carbon budgets and 2050 emissions targets, energy efficiency was trumped by renewable energy and nuclear energy, as well as policy stability and financial incentives. Meanwhile only 6% of those polled cited demand management and reduction as the key policy approach.

In the main, members were unconvinced the UK would meet its approaching carbon budgets and 2050 emissions targets.

MCP August 2016

Figure 1: Within the building sector, through what specific area do you think the greatest efficiency gains can be made?

Energy efficiency in buildings can deliver results both in the short and longer term, if government acts now to set a policy framework that drives investor confidence, consumer demand for energy efficiency, and energy use and behaviour change

While new nuclear is seen by many members as a key pillar of decarbonising power, they believe the sector will suffer from the largest skills shortfall in both the long and mid-term.

Skills shortages in energy storage and smart grid sectors will also suffer the next largest gaps, they believe.

Energy storage Members also singled out energy storage as the technology most in need of innovation, with batteries perceived as potentially the most cost-effective technology at all scales, increasingly so at

smaller scales. But investment and cost, limitations of existing technology and current policy and regulation were perceived as barriers to scale. Meanwhile, around 16% of respondents did not see energy storage playing a significant role in the UK energy system by 2030.

Members believe that gas will be the primary fuel source for both heat and power by 2030, and that oil will continue to largely power transport.

In the power sector, nuclear will play the key supporting role, according to the EI, followed by offshore wind. l energyinst.org missioncriticalpower.uk

20

ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Triad, capacity costs, CfD and RO: Prepare for increases SmartestEnergy has outlined its predictions for power bill non-commodity cost increases from next year. The forecasts suggest significant hikes for some pass through charges

80.00

4,000

70.00

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60.00

3,000

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2,500

30.00

1,500

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1,000

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500

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0 Total to collect from TNUoS (£m)

2016/17

2017/18

2018/19

2019/20

2020/21

Total to collect from TNUoS (£m)

2,708.6

2,840.47

2,983.10

3,174.80

3,789.50

Triad demand (GW)

49.80

49.30

48.20

47.60

47.30

Annual tariff (£/kW)

45.29

46.35

52.92

58.13

72.07

-

2%

14%

10%

24%

Annual rise

level out as the scheme closes to new entrants. The firm also predicts the impact of the small scale Feed-in Tariff (FiT) will increase. Although its forecasts were tempered by new caps on the scheme, SmartestEnergy pointed to the general trend of lower underlying UK demand

120

50

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40

80

30

60

20

40

10

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?

Winter 17

Forecast customer rates Source: Smartest Energy

MCP August 2016

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Winter 18 High case

Winter 19 Mid case

Winter 20

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Forecast customer rate (£/MWh) (N0v-Feb, Mon-Frid, 16:00-19:00)

Volume secured in auction (GW)

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Winter 16

Average tariff (£/kW)

Source: Smartest Energy

Figure 2: Capacity market volume acquired and customer rates

0

Triad demand (GW)

Total to collect from TNUoS

Figure 1: Transmission Network Use of System Charges (TNUoS) Triad demand (GW). Average tariff (£/kW)

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or bills next winter, the greatest unknown is the capacity market charge after the Department of Energy and Climate Change decided to bring the market forward by a year. As brokers and suppliers have warned, the impact on bills will only become clear once the result of the auction is published. It is anticipated that the out-turn may be significantly higher than previous auctions as government tries to legislate to prevent diesel and reciprocal gas engines from scooping the pool.

However, there are also some unknowns around Renewables Obligation (RO) costs, which will be set for next year in September.

Firstly, how many energy intensive industry (EII) firms will qualify for the exemption on renewable levies. The more that qualify, the higher the scheme costs for everyone else. Secondly, whether Drax is granted late approval for the Contracts for Difference (CfD) support scheme. It is currently supported, via bills, through the RO. In all scenarios, said SmartestEnergy, the RO will likely increase next year by about £3/MWh, but will then

Low case

creating a smaller base from which to recover costs.

Meanwhile, although the costs of the CfD scheme currently adds very little to bills, firms will start to feel the impact from next year onwards. SmartestEnergy predicts it could push beyond £9/MWh by 2019/20.

Triad SmartestEnergy said that regional differences in transmission network charges were expected to be more marked in coming years. While firms in Scotland and the north of England could expect to pay less than this year, it predicts increases for all other regions.

The firm also said Triad periods were becoming harder to predict, with many more instances of half hourly demand getting close to the Triad period.

Smartest predicts average Triad costs will increase by 2% next year, but warned firms to expect double digit increases for the following three years That meant firms must double down on sustained energy reduction measures to be sure of hitting Triads. It predicts average Triad costs will increase by 2% next year but warned firms to expect double digit increases for the following three years.

The company outlined its predictions in a webinar earlier in July. A poll of the audience found 88% considered an exit from the EU would have negative consequences for the energy sector. l smartestenergy.com missioncriticalpower.uk

22

ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Esos and the slow death of energy management?

Six months after the original deadline, what has Esos achieved? If nothing else, it has proven that basic energy management is absent in even the largest firms. Brendan Coyne reports

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he majority of companies required to undertake an Esos energy audit have done so. But how many have taken action as a result?

Utilitywise undertook 275 audits, equating to roughly 5% of those firms that met the 31 January deadline.

Of those 275, Tim Hipperson, the firm’s head of special projects, believes as few as 5% are fully acting upon recommendations. “What came out of it loud and clear was that Esos was seen as a cost to the business, with very little upside. There was no mandatory requirement to act upon the recommendations,” he says.

For those that do not implement recommendations, the cost exercise becomes a selffulfilling prophecy.

All pain, no gain?

“In many cases, it was an unbudgeted cost – and it was seen as a pain because there was no mandatory return on investment,” says Hipperson.

“So there hasn’t been a great deal of uptake on the recommendations.” That equates to a lot of wasted energy.

“Out of those 275 organisations, we found just shy of 2,900 energy saving opportunities that would deliver almost half a billion kilowatt hour savings – 461, 335,434 kWh to be precise,” Hipperson says. “That represents nearly 2.5 million tonnes of CO savings, with an average payback of just under four years.”

Even in terms of simple actions, such as metering controls and behavioural change, those 275 organisations could save £11.2m averaging under a two-year payback, claims Hipperson.

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MCP August 2016

I did about 30 Esos audits as lead assessor. Of those 30 I worked with just one dedicated energy manager David Tobin But businesses have other priorities. “There are various other business pressures that they would rather invest in,” he says. “If you are a bus company, you measure it against buying new buses. Energy is not key at board level in a lot of businesses.”

David Tobin, energy consultant

at the Carbon Trust, suggests that may be because dedicated energy management resource is scarce in all but the largest organisations. Without that expertise, he says, boards are unlikely to be presented with sound businesses cases.

The Carbon Trust was involved in about 200 Esos assessments, “some doing all the work, some just providing the lead assessor”, says Tobin.

Around half provided feedback.

“Pretty much all of them have taken forward the evidence pack to form the basis of discussions regarding investment strategies going forward in terms of engaging the board and stakeholders,” he says.

In terms of implementation, Tobin says, “about 80% have already acted upon the recommendations”. However, he says the majority of those actions were low-cost measures that were already part of existing budgets or projects.

For longer payback measures, “of two to three years plus”, which will require new capex budgets, feedback suggests “around 25% of participants will

consider those measures in the near-term”.

That may be higher than the levels seen by Utilitywise and other third parties, “but is by no means a really high number,” says Tobin. “Very few businesses – perhaps 5% – have been interested in embedding energy management best practice in their organisations and considered ISO50001.”

Tobin though thinks that the Esos has brought energy “into sharper focus” for many.

“Leveraging finance for investment beyond what was in initial budgets does take time, which is possibly why we haven’t seen an awful lot [of investment] to date,” he says. “But now, when the investment is made, it is likely to be much more focused in areas of actual benefit to the business – and Esos has been a success in highlighting that.”

Knowledge gaps Esos also shone a spotlight on the need for better energy management.

“Every organisation has gaps in energy management and what we perceive to be

What next for Esos?

Despite post-Brexit vote uncertainty, Utilitywise’s Tim Hipperson thinks Esos is here to stay. “It is enshrined in UK law, so I am very confident there will be a second phase of Esos [in 2019],” he says.

Both the Carbon Trust and Utilitywise think businesses should focus on ISO50001.

The standard goes beyond Esos by mandating that businesses look for continuous improvements in energy efficiency and focus on best practice. Hipperson suggests that while the outcome of the government’s review of energy legislation is unknown “it could be that they are all consolidated under ISO50001”.

In the meantime, Utilitywise is pushing clients to put their energy data onto one of its dashboards, so that they have visibility of energy consumption via an app.

“That is our number one piece of advice. Get your data on a platform where you can visualise and monitor it. If it is in a format where it is easy to understand, you make energy management reporting easier,” says Hipperson. “Then you can get an energy report in your board pack every month – and you can start measuring and proving savings.” missioncriticalpower.uk

Sponsored column

best practice. There wasn’t a single business that we have audited that couldn’t have made improvements,” says Tobin.

“It was clear from our audits that a lot of standard maintenance contracts don’t really have energy efficiency as an agenda item. On a number of occasions we highlighted very quick wins that people were able to make through simple changes.”

Despite Esos being targeted at large organisations, very few had dedicated energy managers, says Tobin. “There is a real gap in the provision of energy management in large businesses – and that might be a reason why [energy] investment is not at the front of the financial director’s mind,” says Tobin. “[The FD] hasn’t got an energy manager presenting a decent business case for these improvements.”

According to Environment Agency data, 40% of early qualifiers had to make estimates of their energy consumption.

Was Tobin surprised?

More surprising, he says, was the lack of dedicated resource.

“I did about 30 [audits] as lead assessor and of those 30 I worked

What came out of it loud and clear was that Esos was seen as a cost to the business, with very little upside. There was no mandatory requirement to act upon the recommendations Tim Hipperson missioncriticalpower.co.uk

with one dedicated energy manager,” says Tobin.

“Predominantly I was working with health and safety or environmental managers. They have other priorities that draw their attention away from pure energy management. So it is not that surprising there were gaps in the energy information, because the resource and time to manage it effectively is not there.

“I think if the resource was there – and the skill was there essentially – then I don’t think we would have been estimating as much as we needed too.”

Prepare for impact Tobin agrees with the suggestion that many large firms might be in for a shock over the next few years, given predictions of steeply rising non-commodity components of energy bills and the impact of more businesses moving to half-hourly settlement.

Half-hourly prices are also expected to become more volatile due to policy and regulatory changes now coming into play.

Meanwhile, although wholesale prices are currently low, a falling pound may drive up commodity prices.

“With recent events there is a lot of uncertainty about what is going to hit everybody – even those that are in the know,” says Tobin. “It would be fair to say that a lot of people don’t know what is around the corner.”

Hipperson agrees. He thinks the move to bring more businesses into half-hourly metering and settlement under P272 legislation could have the most dramatic impact.

“P272 will expose more businesses to red band distribution network charges,” he says. “Once you start showing people that they are using 6% of their energy in the red band but it is accounting for 40% of their energy costs, that’s when it hits home that some kind of management strategy is the first line of defence.

“Shifting demand, managing your energy, upgrading your assets and engaging your staff all starts with energy management, which is a key identifier from the Esos projects.” l

Industrial supply issues bring a new relevance to power factor correction

Stephen Joyce, Power Quality Business Manager at ABB’s Power Grids business in the UK There is a tendency in UK industry to think that the disappearance of reactive power charges from itemised energy bills has killed the argument for installing power factor correction (PFC) equipment. But that view doesn’t reflect the full story. Because as the investment cost and leadtimes for obtaining new power supplies from electricity suppliers continue to escalate, then power factor has taken on a new relevance.

Power factor (PF) is the ratio of ‘real’ power that is used by businesses (in kW) to the ‘apparent’ power that needs to be produced (in kVA). A power factor equal to 1 (unity) demonstrates that power is being produced and consumed most efficiently, and all UK utilities aim for a minimum of 0.95.

Many UK industrial and commercial consumers have low power factors (well below 0.8) due to their extensive use of lightly loaded electric motors, pumps, fluorescent lighting and other inductive equipment. The impact of low power factor is that more apparent power needs to be produced to meet the real power requirement of businesses.

Ultimately, this imposes costs on society, such as the need for more generation capacity as well as additional transmission and distribution network capacity,

and increased greenhouse gas emissions.

There is a relatively simple solution available in the form of PFC equipment, such as automatic capacitor banks.

In fact, the BEAMA Capacitor Manufacturers Association (BCMA) has estimated that in the UK this equipment has removed the need to generate a further 2 terawatthours (TWh) of electricity a year and maintains CO2 emissions savings of 1.2 million tonnes.

Even so, many manufacturing sites are still operating close to their maximum load, so that future expansion would require major investment in new power infrastructure. Yet installation of PFC equipment can often improve the site’s energy efficiency to the point where extra capacity is freed up to cope with new, additional loads using only the existing supplies. And that capacity is there ready to use, right now.

To quote just one example, we recently helped a small manufacturing company that was planning to expand production.

But it had been quoted £150,000 to construct the additional power infrastructure it needed, combined with the disruption involved in digging up local roads. Our survey established that the site was operating at a power factor of 0.57.

Installing PFC soon restored this to 0.95, effectively freeing up an extra 81 A to more than meet the demand of the new facility.

abb.com

24

DSR Event 2016

Why you need to attend our DSR conference The next couple of years will be a bumpy ride for businesses. Those that can access the flexibility in their assets and operations will insulate themselves from volatility and rising costs

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on-energy parts of your electricity bill will increase sharply during the next few years.

Levies to support renewable generation, combined with levies to balance that renewable generation and ensure security of supply, will start to become more significant from next winter.

Changes to the balancing and settlement regime will make half-hourly prices spikier. Transmission charges (Triads) are set to increase by more than 10% the year after next, according to analysis by energy companies. Many more businesses are also being moved to half-hourly metering and settlement this year, meaning more companies will be exposed to peak charging.

MCP August 2016

Meanwhile, thermal plant closures have diminished National Grid’s ability to balance the power system using spinning reserve.

Reduced inertia requires increased demand-side participation. In other words, there is an opportunity to reduce costs and generate income for businesses that provide balancing services – turning equipment on or off, up or down, when required.

Or there is increased price risk for passive energy consumers. It is worth noting that National Grid recently said it expected balancing costs to double from £1bn per year to £2bn within five years.

While wholesale power costs are low, the non-energy parts of the bill now make

There is an opportunity to reduce costs and generate income for businesses that provide balancing services – turning equipment on or off, up or down, when required

up about half of the total – and they will rise for the foreseeable future. Meanwhile, shrinking capacity margins could add to wholesale power price volatility, presenting both an opportunity and a threat to businesses.

Those factors make it good time to find out more about demand-side response.

National Grid, Decc, energy suppliers, aggregators and industrial and commercial end-users will outline the opportunities for businesses at the DSR Event on 8 September in London. It is free to firms wishing to find out how they can provide balancing services. l Reserve your seat at dsrevent.uk missioncriticalpower.uk

25

80% of firms would provide demandside response if business not disrupted

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ore than 80% of businesses would be interested in earning revenue through demand-side response (DSR) programmes – provided their business operations are not adversely affected.

A survey of public and private sector end-users by MCP’s sister title The Energyst found 81% would be willing to sign up to schemes run by National Grid to help balance

the power system on that basis.

Concern over disruption and impact on business performance was cited by 36% of respondents as a key barrier to DSR participation.

A similar percentage said their equipment or processes were not suited to balancing services provision.

Roughly a quarter said they did not understand enough about the market to make a

decision, while roughly a fifth did not trust third parties to take control of their equipment or processes.

The survey polled businesses that already participate in DSR schemes as well as those that do not.

Of those involved in DSR provision, 83% said they were satisfied with the outcome.

Of those that do not, 58% said their business had some form of back-up generation.

However, less than half (46%) said neither their electricity supplier nor aggregators had outlined the benefits of flexible power consumption to them.

The survey will form part of Energyst Media’s second annual demand-side response report, to be published 8 September at the DSR event, a free conference in London sponsored by National Grid, energy suppliers and aggregators. l

DSR Event 2016 Demand-Side Response Thursday 8th September 2016 / Banking Hall, London, UK

Last few remaining places.

If you want to find out how you can monetise your maintenance regime and earn revenue from existing assets, you should register now.

The DSR event is almost full.

Visit www.dsrevent.uk to secure your seat missioncriticalpower.uk

August 2016 MCP

26

POWER STORAGE

Optimising through storage Buildings and facilities such as data centres are able to optimise their energy strategy and lower the costs of running the building with the advances in storage technology.

Tim McManan-Smith met up with Eaton’s distributed energy management segment manager EMEA Louis Shaffer

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aton has partnered with Nissan (batteries) and AES (large scale storage market leader) to cover both grid scale and smaller industrial scale storage options. Partly because of the proliferation of renewable energy generation in Europe it is expected to grow rapidly. Eaton forecasts its EMEA market to reach about ¤6bn by 2024.

Battery storage is able to support the reduction of a businesses carbon footprint by optimising onsite renewables.

However, building owners without renewables can also reduce their electricity bills.

Storage in many markets can generate revenues by providing grid ancillary services. As costs fall, many new applications are emerging driven by unique market dynamics such as UK

grid challenges as spare capacity becomes limited. The use of batteries to aid demand-side response programmes will allow new revenue streams to be exploited while ensuring continuity of supply.

Batteries will ensure backup of critical loads. “Batteries will not replace a gen-set,” comments Shaffer. “The cost is currently too high [about $300/kWh (£225/ kWh)], but for short periods such as peak shaving or in the event of a power failure they are coming into their own.”

At present batteries are a power tool and not an energy one, although this has the potential to change as mass production from the likes of Nissan and Tesla, to name just two, reduces costs further.

Technology is moving fast. “In three to four years time you will

In three to four years time you will get 30% more capacity from the same size battery

get 30% more capacity from the same size battery,” says Shaffer.

What about people holding off investing because of the rapidly advances? Shaffer says that “many start small and trial it with the capacity to expand further as they go along taking advantage of any new developments”.

He believes that the energy market is changing and that distributed systems will win over centralised in the medium to long term. “It happened with computers with large mainframe systems being replaced with lap-tops, tablets and smart phones. Distributed wins over centralised when the technology is good.”

He says in the future “utility companies will be like banks are to money. It’s like BT in telecoms. They’re still there.” l eaton.eu/powerquality

First DC in France with energy storage Eaton’s energy storage technologies, developed in collaboration with Nissan, have been implemented in host and telecoms operator Webaxys’ newly launched data centre in Saint-Romain de Colbosc near Le Havre, France.

Webaxys CEO Emmanuel Assié says: “In addition to relying on electricity generated entirely using renewable sources and the optimisation of energy-efficient technologies already used in our first data centre, we wanted to go further and commit to reducing our energy dependency to minimise our environmental impact.”

Eaton Industries France marketing director Stéphane Egros adds: “Webaxys is a pilot site in Europe and highlights the importance of our battery energy storage solution developed in partnership with Nissan. This system combines the technological know-how of Nissan, which produces its own batteries, and our associated electricity management systems.”

Incorporating renewable energies such as solar power – which is, by its nature, intermittent into the operation of data centres, where power cuts cannot be tolerated – means that this energy has to be stored. Eaton rose to the challenge and in 2013 helped launch the GreenDataNet consortium, which was financed by the European Community. Led by Eaton, the project aims to develop new technologies, enabling the creation of smarter, more energy-efficient urban data centres.

MCP August 2016

In late 2015, Eaton entered into a partnership with Nissan to deploy energy storage and management solutions in a commercial environment. Nissan batteries, which are used at full capacity in the Leaf saloon, the world’s bestselling fully electric car, are given a new lease of life in this application. This eco-responsible approach helps to maximise the use of batteries before they are recycled, minimising the use of natural resources.

The new Webaxys data centre incorporates solar power and an optimised air-to-air cooling system. All the infrastructure equipment for the data centre has been supplied by Eaton. missioncriticalpower.uk

28

MODULAR SOLUTIONS

When the cloud comes out of the container Rittal and iNNOVO Cloud have come together to create a ‘turnkey cloud data centre in a container’ concept. It was showcased at CeBIT 2016 exhibition in Hannover and aims to show how companies can rapidly establish new cloud-based data centres

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he exciting ‘RiMatrix Balanced Cloud Centre’ (RiMatrix BCC) concept combines Rittal’s global-leading IT racks, containers, climate control technology and power distribution with the complete cloud infrastructure, including OpenStack cloud management software supplied and installed by iNNOVO Cloud.

Companies would use the components within the RiMatrix BCC to model a huge range of options to meet their needs, from an on-premises private cloud to virtual private data centres, all using verifiably safe servers, storage and network systems. Server and storage systems can be operated in a way that is both standardised and cost-effective using services from the cloud, provided as IT as a Service (ITaaS).

The industrialisation of data centre construction now enables companies to create their own powerful IT infrastructure solutions more quickly than ever before

Until now, planning and constructing a data centre had been considered as being an entirely bespoke process taking several years for companies to complete.

But with this joint initiative, Rittal and iNNOVO Cloud have created an alternative in the RiMatrix BCC that could offer a far faster solution.

Customers would receive a turnkey cloud data centre in ISO or non-ISO container format in which the components such as racks, climate control and power supply would be provided as predefined modules.

However, for the first time, the server, network and storage woud be included with the delivery already pre-configured.

Furthermore, the cloud management software would be provided courtesy of the open

The RiMatrix Balanced Cloud Centre combines Rittal’s expertise in IT infrastructure and data centre modules with iNNOVO Cloud’s experience designing and operating cloud platforms

MCP August 2016

source ‘OpenStack’ framework.

The result is a standardised and completely virtualised cloud data centre, equally suitable for standard and highly demanding applications, such as highperformance computing (HPC) or ‘big data’ purposes.

Rittal’s director international IT projects Martin Kipping says: “The industrialisation of data centre construction now enables companies to create their own powerful IT infrastructure solutions more quickly and easily than ever before.

“Time-to-market is a critical factor for companies. Rittal’s container solutions exhibited at CeBIT show how we can address these requirements and help customers with modular IT systems to meet the growing demand for high and scalable computing performance,” he adds.

At CeBIT 2016 in March, visitors had the opportunity to walk through the RiMatrix BCC container to get a close-up view of the quality of the product and all its component parts.

This joint enterprise from Rittal and iNNOVO Cloud has Rittal’s expertise in IT infrastructure and data centre modules while iNNOVO Cloud’s experience designing and operating cloud platforms.

The focus has been on delivering ITaaS so that the server, storage, network and applications collectively run in as standardised a way as possible, laying the foundations for a company-specific, bespoke cloud platform. l rittal.co.uk friedhelm-loh-group.com missioncriticalpower.uk

30

COOLING & AIR MOVEMENT

Merging renewable sources for the best operating efficiency Climaveneta has launched a premium efficiency chiller that uses outdoor air to cool a building

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limaveneta has widened its line of free-cooling units with the TECS-FC: a highperformance air cooled chiller range with magnetic levitation compressors, flooded evaporator and EC fans.

Dedicated to IT cooling and process cooling applications where cooling demand is constant all year round, the new free-cooling chillers use cold outdoor air for cooling the indoor environment, harnessing the savings potential contained in this renewable source.

Highly efficient The TECS-FC features a managed free-cooling system: according to the outdoor air conditions and operating water temperature, the chiller automatically switches between total free-cooling, hybrid free-cooling and mechanical cooling mode. As the outdoor air temperature drops 1°C below the returning water temperature the unit

starts using outdoor air to cool water (hybrid free-cooling), partially benefitting from the free-cooling effect. The freecooling capacity grows with lower air temperatures, until it covers the entire cooling demand and the compressors are completely switched off (total free-cooling), therefore achieving high operating efficiency (EER values around 220).

But premium performance results are not only delivered during the total free-cooling mode. Within the hybrid and mechanical operations, in fact, the technology of the compressors with magnetic levitation brings benefits in terms of performance, adjustment, vibrations and weight, keeping the unit EER efficiency values always above competitive technologies, claims Climaveneta.

At the core of the TECS-FC is the advanced controller with proprietary settings dedicated to the precise management of all the

Figure 1: A comparison of the EER (energy efficiency ratio – a ratio of the cooling capacity to the power input) of a chiller with magnetic levitation technology and Climaveneta’s TECS-FC

MCP August 2016

Figure 2: An illustration of free cooling and hybrid cooling use 99.9% of the time

TECS-FC is the perfect solution for projects requiring constant cooling all year round unit’s different dynamics and operating modes. The controller has an intuitive and user-friendly interface with LED icons, designed to ensure a clear reading of all the variables and immediate view of all circuits.

TECS-FC is the perfect solution for projects requiring constant cooling all year round, namely data centres, process cooling and telecommunication infrastructures.

To protect the customer from any risk of cooling interruption, Climaveneta has developed dedicated countermeasures.

The Fast Restart function, for example, ensures, after an unexpected power failure,

an immediate start-up of the chiller operation within 26 seconds from the power coming back on.

Additionally, the TECS-FC, thanks to an ATS (automatic transfer switch), can be connected to two separate power lines. In case of a main line power outage, the ATS automatically switches over to the other line, granting uninterrupted power supply to the unit. The double power supply grants the cooling system dependability and makes TECS-FC ideal for the premium TIER III and TIER IV design topologies, the highest standards of reliability.

The new chiller is now available in both the standard (K) and high efficiency (CA) versions, delivering cooling capacities from 302 to 1649kW. As a further option, the unit can be selected with the No-Glycol configuration and with the new green HFO 1234ze refrigerant, providing customers with a large array of design possibilities aimed at satisfying demanding project requirements. l climaveneta.co.uk missioncriticalpower.uk

32

UPS

Digital demands of today Modular technology is driving efficiencies in the UPS field. Riello explains what the advantages can be and takes a look at how one business has implemented a modular UPS solution and the impact it has had

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PS customers are seeking solutions to cover all bases – a product that is efficient, flexible, resilient and available.

Space is also a major factor when choosing power protection as, ultimately, space saving equals money saving.

The answer to these requirements is the modular solution – one of the fastest growing technologies in the UPS marketplace that has minimum footprint. And researchers anticipate even further growth – earlier this year, research analyst Technavio predicted that the global modular UPS market will grow steadily at a rate of 10% between 2016 and 2020.

So why modular?

Modular technology is driving efficiencies in the UPS field because of the ability to easily

the demands of the business – pushing up levels of efficiency and driving down costs.

DSM has the ability to scale its UPS as it grows scale power up and down to suit the load. A UPS module can be slotted into a UPS cabinet as required, saving on capital expenditure and maximising efficiency. Efficiency levels of modular UPS systems can reach as high as 96.5% – even at low loads of 20%. Modular design offers the maximum in

availability, scalability, reliability and serviceability while also offering high efficiency, low cost of ownership and high power density. This makes the modular solution ideal for businesses looking for a flexible solution which is still highly efficient.

It means that businesses can pick a UPS that ‘grows’ with

Keeping your business alive with DSM Group DSM has built an established reputation as a provider of business continuity and data centre services. For DSM, maintaining a reliable power supply to customer equipment is the lifeblood of its business.

With reliability at its core, DSM maintains the highest standards of resiliency to ensure continuous business supply for its customers, which include, among others, Yorkshire Building Society, Travelex, Anglian Water and Royal & Sun Alliance.

The challenge DSM was looking to upgrade the UPS power infrastructure at its Sibson

IT infrastructure from smallest to largest.

ENCLOSURES

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POWER DISTRIBUTION

CLIMATE CONTROL

34

INFRASTRUCTURE

R&D progress for efficiency There is a proliferation in the quantity of data and it is increasing exponentially.

Tim McManan-Smith met up with Huawei account manager for data centre infrastructure James Coughlan to look at some of the solutions and discuss efficiency

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hinese technology firm Huawei Technologies Co believes that getting the edge over competitors and leading the way to future efficient operation of data centres will come through research. It invests 6% of its turnover ($9bn) in R&D and has 70,000 out of 170,000 of its engineers working in this field.

“We are involved in all areas of data centre infrastructure from UPS, cooling, containment, HVDC, DCIM, to modular ISO container solutions,” says James Coughlan.

“We work through partners such as PCL in the UK to deliver our enterprise solutions,

we have to trust that the installation is as good as our product solutions,” comments Coughlan.

Using Silicon instead of copper with its UPS, Huawei has enables and efficiency of 97.5% to be realised. “The real key to achieving UPS efficiency, though,” comments Coughlan, “is being able to keep high efficiencies at low loads. We are still at 97% with 40% load and 96% at 30%. It delivers as demand is needed. For efficienicy you only want the minimum number of locatotives needed for a set amount of carriages.”

The real key to achieiving UPS efficiency is being able to keep high efficiencies at low loads

Coming from the telecomms industry Huawei has always had a focus on energy efficiency.

“We have history of proving solutions in countries that do not have much or reliable power supplies. At present we are near the limits of what people are prepared to pay for. We can do a UPS that is 98% efficient, however, no one wants to pay for gold plated connectors," says Coughlan.

Huawei’s R&D is yielding returns in a market that increasingly wants high density solutions that require more cooling and at the same time a low PUE. Currently it has more than 3,000 IT patents and more than 500 network energy patents (conatining its data centre division).

“We want to convince people that we are a serious vendor in this market and that we are the future,” says Coughlan. l huawei.co.uk

PCL picks up top partner award Power Control Ltd (PCL) has picked up the Best Partner Award from Huawei Technologies Co. The award, which was presented at Huawei’s Network and Energy Conference in Frankfurt, recognises the commitment and diligence demonstrated by PCL. Since becoming a Value Added Partner for Huawei earlier this year, PCL has already installed more than 2MVA of final load UPS across a multitude of industry sectors including co-location data centres, wholesalers and building and construction.

The company is also in discussions with a prestigious financial institution, a large co-location data centre and a renowned British car manufacturing and aero-engine manufacturing company.

PCL sales director Rob Mather, who accepted the award on behalf of the company, said: “The modular technologies from Huawei have been incredibly well received in the UK and we have some excellent opportunities in the pipeline. As we saw during the conference in Frankfurt, Huawei is extremely forward MCP August 2016

thinking and is wholly dedicated to continuous design and innovation, which places its UPS products at the cutting edge of emergency power solutions.”

Huawei account manager for data centre infrastructure James Coughlan said: “We have been really impressed with PCL’s professionalism and tenacity in identifying new opportunities and securing new business. PCL has far exceeded our expectations in raising the profile of the Huawei UPS5000-E series and we remain confident that PCL is the best UPS specialist to position it at the forefront of the UK marketplace.”

Designed for medium to large data centres, the modular Huawei UPS5000-E UPS series is a reliable, flexible and efficient power protection solution that has been developed with future expansion in mind. Hot swappable modules, online maintenance and intelligent battery management are just some of the features that make the Huawei UPS5000-E UPS one of the most advanced modular UPS solutions available. pcl.co.uk missioncriticalpower.uk

INFRASTRUCTURE

35

Sudlows delivers data centre project for Stockport Council Critical Infrastructure specialist Sudlows was commissioned by Stockport Council to deliver a state-of-the-art data centre to support current and future needs

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udlows’ £300,000 contract with Stockport Council for a new data centre included a number of new facilities to increase capacity, improved energy efficiency and ease of management via a single interface. The data centre will the first in the UK to be fitted with an cooling system developed by Airedale.

Airedale International Air Conditioning sales engineer Paul Golding says: “Airedale worked closely with infrastructure specialist Sudlows to develop a resilient cooling solution for Stockport Council that incorporates the SmartCool SV DX invertermissioncriticalpower.uk

driven PAC. The SmartCool SV provides a highly efficient route to cooling that delivers excellent part-load efficiencies, very precise control and lower capacity turndown that are maximised via integration with Airedale’s ACIS building management system.”

Adrian Davies, Stockport Council’s IT operations manager, says: “Stockport is an innovative council delivering a wide range of public services to around 286,000 residents.

“The essential infrastructure provided by the Sudlows team forms one part of our wider Digital by Design programme, which aims to improve our digital offer through a new

This new facility will help us to deliver this by providing additional resilience, security and reduce energy costs from our core facility

website and make better use of the data the council holds.

“This new facility will help us to deliver this by providing additional resilience, security and reduce energy costs from our core facility.”

Chris Dummett, commercial director at Sudlows, comments: “Stockport Council is a dynamic council which aims to deliver a wider range of digital services to the local residents of Stockport. This important project will not only allow for greater expansion of services and access for residents but will also deliver a more environmental, reliable and energy efficient system.” l sudlows.com August 2016 MCP

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POWER DISTRIBUTION UNITS

Power and powerful data The PDU is no longer solely about power distribution. It can provide a detailed snapshot of the operation of the data centre server rack as a whole

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ighlighted in the IHS report Rack Power Distribution Units 2015, the increase in demand for intelligent power distribution units “is driven by the need to monitor power usage, report efficiency metrics, decrease power use in the data centre and enable capacity planning”.

Once solely about power distribution, PDAs now provide a source of data to give you a detailed snapshot of the operation of the data centre server rack as a whole, especially with far higher density units being installed at the cabinet level.

Choosing PDUs that have ports to allow the addition of temperature and humidity sensors adds to the range of information available. The power data of current, voltage, power, energy consumption and power factor of the PDU is usually displayed locally on a RMS current meter, also accessible via a centralised remote management platform where the administrator can remotely manage the PDUs and the environmental sensors connected by the web browser or integrated into the BMS. If sites are predominantly driven by single-phase distributed supply it is usual to see up to four intelligent rack PDU’s mounted per cabinet with a total of around 96 outlets or sockets per cabinet. Where sites have distributed three phase then it is common for the intelligent rack PDU’s to use as many as 48 or more outlets per PDU. Who holds the power?

So we have the data from the PDUs installed in the racks but who is responsible for it now?

The same data can be used by different departments within the

MCP August 2016

same organisation, for example both facilities and IT require the data from the PDUs but in majority of cases facilities feeds the PDU data into the BMS whereas IT integrates the data into a data center infrastructure management solution.

Facilities are approaching the data and looking at environmental factors, power usage and how to improve efficiency to be able to determine cost savings at a facility expenditure level, using the data for alerting

Facilities are approaching the data and looking at environmental factors, power usage and how to improve efficiency to be able to determine cost savings at a facility expenditure level

to maximise the operational temperature within the room/ hall leading to reduction in air conditioning costs.

Whereas IT departments’ interests are for remote site management including socket switching on the PDUs – negating the requirement and cost for an engineer to attend site, change control management, enablement of inter-departmental billing, capacity planning (maximum amount of equipment in each rack) and factors such as unauthorised equipment deployment.

It is not just facilities and IT. Areas such as AV and security also use intelligent power within racks and enclosures.

One common objective of all departments is minimising the risk of downtime, as any outage can have a severe impact and implications on a business. When Amazon.com went dark for approximately 49 minutes in January 2013, it cost the company an estimated $4m in lost sales. According to IBM in 2011, of the companies that had a major loss of business data, 43% never

reopen and 51% close within two years.

The past few years have seen a shift with in-house data centre space beginning to decrease while co-location and third party data centre space continues to rise year on year. The DCD Census 2015 anticipated 7.7% growth for 2015. This poses a number of challenges for co-location data centres and their tenants.

One such challenge is secure access to power for multi-tenant areas within co-location data centres. While larger tenants may have the rack volume to fulfil an entire data hall or accommodate security cages, those at the other end of the spectrum, which are looking at taking quarter or half rack space, find themselves potentially sharing cabinets with other tenants (maybe even competition). Co-location racks therefore need to have physical division from a security perspective, ideally a smart card access solution or similar installed as opposed to the rack manufacturer’s standard lock/ key configuration whereby all cells would be accessible from the same key.

Once inside the rack the tenant requires access to power and reassurance that their equipment is not going to be affected by a fellow tenant having access to inadvertently or maliciously disconnect their devices.

The co-location provider supplying and needing to charge for the power consumption per tenant requires power metering accuracy from the PDUs. Using intelligent PDUs in each cell enables the power usage data to be accessed remotely negating the need for access into the tenants rack. l austin-hughes.eu missioncriticalpower.uk

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PRODUCTS

Dataracks helps Hydro66 to break the mould Hydro66 has created what it claims is the world’s first purposebuilt hydroelectric powered co-location data centre in Sweden, choosing Dataracks for its racks, cages and aisle containment solutions.

Hydro66 chief executive officer Andy Long explains: “There are three main advantages to locating data centres in Scandinavia: a favourable climate; abundant renewable energy; and local expertise. Although these benefits were recognised by the major internet drivers several years ago, co-location providers have – for the most part –continued to develop the traditional city locations, with their associated high costs, limited space and unstable power supplies.”

Hydro66 chief technical officer Christiaan Keet takes up the story: “When choosing a rack provider, we visited various manufacturers and were immediately impressed by the way we

Modular data centre JV Mission critical cooling solutions provider Stulz has announced a joint venture and majority shareholding in Technology Space Integration (TSI), a global manufacturer of modular data centre solutions for the high performance computing (HPC), Cloud, enterprise and end user markets including micro data centres.

The joint venture will enable the two companies to cooperate closely in delivering modular data centre solutions globally.

Stulz managing director Oliver Stulz comments: “We have identified modular data centres as a

MCP August 2016

growing market segment.

This joint venture with TSI allows us to offer customers a complete solution for modular data centres from high performance computing to telecom enclosures using the latest bespoke designed cooling Stulz technology.”

TSI managing director Simon Gardner adds: “Partnering with Stulz enables us to compete at all levels and support our global clients with a worldwide service organisation network which comprises approximately 6000 service staff.” stulz.co.uk tsiuk.com

were received at Dataracks’ factory in Cambridgeshire.

Dataracks’ designs make it as straightforward as possible to work with their products; they are easy to access, adjust and tailor, while still being really solid and secure. They also provide very good airflow management, with a range of blanking plates to ensure the most efficient air pathway.

“Although we had concerns over the logistics, I’m pleased to say that Dataracks proved my fears over not using locally sourced racks completely wrong; everything ran smoothly and nothing has ever been late. The company’s installation team were also top notch – extremely professional and very good at what they do.” dataracks.com

InRow DX cuts consumption Schneider Electric has introduced the second generation of the InRow DX (direct expansion) 600mm, providing the high density cooling data centre managers need to maintain critical facility temperatures.

This secondgeneration release improves cooling efficiency by reducing power consumption while also increasing capacity.

Capable of high-density cooling up to 42kW with a 4000 SCFM max airflow in a small 600mm-wide footprint, Schneider Electric’s InRow DX solution provides high partial-load energy savings, cutting energy consumption by 50% over first generation technology. The savings come from the use of new brushless variable

speed scroll compressors and EC fans.

The InRow DX design couples cooling with the IT heat load, preventing hot air recirculation, while improving cooling predictability and allowing for a pay as you grow environment.

Available in selfcontained, fluidcooled and air-cooled configurations with or without humidity control, these products meet the diverse requirements for closet, server room, and data center cooling.

The addition of Active Flow Control, which measures air pressure inside the containment system and automatically adjusts fan speed to match the exact airflow of the IT equipment, increases precision and efficiency. schneider-electric.com

missioncriticalpower.uk

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PRODUCTS

High-density fibre cabling system for high-performance DCs Panduit has launched the HD Flex 2.0 Fibre Cabling System. Engineered to provide high fibre density and serviceability for high-performance data centres, the latest addition to Panduit’s expansive line of fibre solutions has been designed for ease of integration with existing fibre infrastructure by accommodating fibre cassettes and fibre adapter panels (FAPs) with different port counts within the same enclosure and panel.

Six-port or 12-port cassettes and FAPs can be deployed in virtually any combination to achieve up to 144-fibres (LC) or 864-fibres (MPO) per rack unit.

This solution enables seamless port migration from 10G to 25/40/50/100G in the same RU space without replacing existing fibres and provides savings.

Marc Naese, senior vice-president of Panduit’s Data Center Business Unit, says: “Today’s IT managers are increasingly

tasked with providing higher data speeds while controlling costs by maximising return on assets. Panduit’s HD Flex Fibre Cabling System achieves both. It is designed for optimum serviceability and manageability, providing the scalability

Faster problem solving 6SigmaDCX 10 is an engineering simulation toolkit for data centres that features cloud compatibility in conjunction with a supercharged version of Future Facilities’ solver engine.

It will allow for up to 6x speed on previous solving times, enabling engineers to accurately predict the impact of change to the data centre environment at a pace in keeping with the demands of modern business and without sacrificing important modelling details.

The functionality is complemented by a partnership with cloud provider Rescale, freeing engineers from the burden

MCP August 2016

of expensive hardware solutions in favour of scalable, unlimited compute power.

For conceptual design, simple models have a quick turnaround.

However, for mission critical operational sites, models require significantly more detail to ensure they are reflective of reality. Traditionally, computational fluid dynamics has been criticised for taking too long to be used as an operational tool. The DCX 10 offers users accurate results in the shortest time possible.

The release gives engineers control over the entire DC ecosystem, incorporating external monitoring tools for modelling plant infrastructure and the outside environment, along with the white space itself.

6sigmadcx.com

to increase density as business demands evolve.”

The HD Flex 2.0 Fibre Cabling System also provides a clear path for adopting Cisco Nexus* 9000 Series Switches and ACI* 40Gig and spine-leaf architecture with a reliable physical infrastructure. It offers the lowest installation and test costs through the utilisation of 12-port cassettes, as fewer cassettes are required per RU of rack space.

Stephen Morris, senior product manager, Panduit EMEA, DC Connectivity Solutions adds: “The first HD Flex solution has been widely specified and deployed as a global standard by many of our customers over the past two years. HD Flex 2.0 provides DC managers with new options to provision for future higher bandwidth migration paths, logically replicate switch/server ports, scale the network, increase speed of deployment and maximise up-time.” panduit.com/hdflex

Fire concerns Drop Away Minkels has launched Drop Away Panels in response to the worldwide increased demand for security and safety solutions in data centres.

Drop Away Panels are designed roof panels for data centre aisle containment to enhance fire safety within data centre environments.

“Under the influence of the cloud, there is a growing focus on data centre security solutions,” says Bas Jacobs, product manager at Minkels, “Demand for data centre security and safety solutions is amplified by an increased focus on security topics within the European EN 50600 data centre standard.”

The customer demand which led to the introduction of the Drop Away Panels originated

in the UK. Some Minkels customers needed roof assemblies like the Drop Away Panels to meet ‘FM Global’ insurance requirements. According to Minkels, Drop Away Panels significantly enhance fire safety within data centre environments while ensuring energy efficiency requirements.

The panels can be used in combination with water fire extinguishing systems with sprinklers.

When temperature gets above 65°C, the plastic frames of the Drop Away Panels automatically soften and the lightweight panels will drop down to make way for the water sprinklers or water mist systems. minkels.com

missioncriticalpower.uk

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42

Q&A

Gavin McCormick Beond Group’s consulting director on Donald Trump, alien life and decent bourbon Who would you least like to share a lift with? Why? Not wanting to go down the political route but Donald Trump. I’d actually want to meet him and see if he is as obnoxious as I think but then I think he’d probably start to annoy me after a couple of floors.

You’re God for the day.

What’s the first thing you do? I’d prove that I exist and then sit back with a nice bourbon and what the drama unfold. I’m not overly religious but I think God would appreciate a decent bourbon.

If you could travel back in time to a period in history, what would it be and why?

There’s a lot of places and times I’d like to experience but for very different reasons. It’s difficult to pick one of those over another so I’d say I’d go back to the mid ’90s and explain to a much younger self that shell suits are not fashionable. If I had to be more sensible in my choice then I’d pick any time where the human civilisation was just starting as it would be interesting to see how life was when we were vastly more innocent and less developed – with no technology.

Who or what are you enjoying listening to?

Right now I have the Rock of Ages soundtrack on Spotify as I do love a good bit of cheesy rock.

I switch quite a lot.

Spotify has to be the best thing ever

MCP August 2016

lost reading them without having to think too hard.

I’d like to see if there is intelligent life on other planets and if we are really not alone invented when it comes to music as I’d be constantly buying different genres.

What unsolved mystery would you like the answers to? I’d like to see if there is intelligent life on other planets and if we are really not alone. I’m quite intrigued by the various theories that are out there when it comes to aliens and if it’s not true then what really did happen to all those cows?

If you could perpetuate a myth about yourself, what would it be? That I’m incredibly knowledgeable and insightful at what I do. OK, I’d like to think I’m doing a great job at what I do but everyone else thinking it would make life easier when you’re trying to push through changes.

What would your super power be and why? I’d like to be able to fly, mainly because I use the Tube in really hot weather and also so I could avoid the plague of tourists who think it’s acceptable to stand in the middle of a corridor or platform and look completely vacant at each other.

What would you do with a million pounds?

Realise that it’s simply not enough to retire on and feel quite sad. I’d then buy a Ford Mustang Mach 1 (around 1971 was a good vintage) and enjoy the noise.

What would you take to a desert island and why?

I’d bring along Bear Grylls as while I’d like to think I could wrestle any of the local wildlife into submission or build myself a fancy looking hut, I’m quite likely to be really pathetic at pretty much everything as I once got chased by a Chinchilla.

What’s your greatest extravagance?

I’m not overly extravagant as I don’t have time to be but I’d say my holidays as I love to travel and see new places. Second to that would be my taste in bourbon, as anyone who says Jack Daniels is a bourbon really needs educating.

What’s your favourite film (or book) and why?

Films are a difficult one for me as it depends on my mood but you can’t beat a good book.

I love a good book which immerses you into the story so I’d say the Game of Thrones books are great as you can get

If you were blessed with any talent, what would your dream job be and why? I’d like to be more talented at reading other people as that always makes life easier.

What is the best piece of advice ever been given?

“Always treat people how you wish to be treated.” I really do believe in karma and think the world would be a much better placed if we all treated each other how we would want to be treated.

What irritates you the most in life? Aside from tourists on the Tube it has to be car drivers who can’t and don’t seem able to use their indicators.

What should the energy users be doing to help itself in the current climate? At Beond we offer a very close partnership with our clients to help them manage the issues they are faced with and take advantage of opportunities. However, while evolving our services to meet the changing market is critically important, a lot of energy users tend to not focus beyond their current or immediate needs. Brexit is a perfect example of why organisations should expand their thinking as there are a number of energy market scenarios which could occur.

OK, multiple scenarios can often confuse people as it’s difficult to see which one may occur until nearer the time but planning and preparation for all eventualities (over a longer time horizon) better prepares an organisation to react quicker and less emotionally to changes.

What’s the best thing – work wise – that you did recently? Make the jump to Beond and realise that a smaller consultancy is often more effective, flexible and innovative and that bigger is not always better. l missioncriticalpower.uk