Tuesday 30 December 2014

2014 Year in review

Well, as its Christmas we get some time to chill out and relax, perhaps do some work or just sit and think about what comes next.

Before that though, I'd like to review this year as its been very exciting.

Back in Jan 14, we were requested to help out on a bid for a large UK based Telco to install cold aisle containment at 130+ sites, sadly after about a months work of work, the client decided to use its own in house team.

We were also frustrated by another potential client regarding the preparation of some management systems for ISO accreditation, we were a little too expensive, but our quotation included a lot of the work that wasn't included by the other parties, and would have to have been completed in house so all in all we were about right on the costing but headline costs in a competitive situation are key.

We spent two weeks in June cooped up in the UEL with the DCA and Green IT Amsterdam amongst others to prepare a bid for EU funding, which we found out in November has been accepted, so this project will commence in March 2015, more details closer to the launch date and project commencement.

I visited the US, well Texas actually in April to conduct a CEEDA assessment for ARM, Austin followed by two UK re-assessments for ARM Cambridge and St Andrews universities, both retaining their GOLD CEEDA's.
In November I was off to Sydney, Australia to undertake another re-assessment for Westpac and then a week later to visit Hong Kong to assess a data centre on behalf of one of the Utilities and their High Energy Efficiency pilot site.
Both of these have just been audited this week so I cannot reveal their award grades as yet, watch this space.

We've also been doing bits and pieces of work for ICEOTOPE, the liquid cooled server solution and we hope to do some more work next year.

So, next year, we'll be spending a lot of time on our EU project, still assessing data centres for CEEDA and the EUCOC and doing some ad-hoc work all based on energy efficiency for some other major clients.

As always we'll keep you up to date on this blog, our website and social media feeds.

Oh, almost forgot, we are in discussions with a few interested parties over a radical new project, this is close to being revealed, but not yet, not yet.

Saturday 25 October 2014

Q4 Update

There have been some changes to the schedule since our last update and we'll be covering those later.
Firstly, some updates on other news, we attended the CDCAP course in early September and we have been advised that our MD is now an official Certified Data Centre Auditing Professional or CDCAP.

We attended two meeting in Brussels in early October, the first was a DG Connect organised event to discuss the future of the EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres (Energy Efficiency) which I think should have its short form changed from EUCoC to EUCoC DC (EE) in order to differentiate it from other EU Codes of Conduct.
Anyway, much was said, much was argued, but we await to see what will actually happen, what we can say is that it looks increasingly likely, given recent events in EU Climate Change & Energy  Policy that mandatory use of the EUCoC DC (EE) is definitely on the cards, when and how this will be achieved is still subject to review
We understand that in line with the UK, the French Government has recently required that all data centres providing services to their public services are required to be EUCoC DC (EE) which is why we've seen a large increase in the amount of data centres seeking participation status. There will also be a separation of the technical and administrative elements, the technical side will fall more into line with current standardisation bodies and will have liaison between the Green Grid, CENELEC, and ISO and representatives have already been appointed and I expect further news on this early next week (27th October 2014).
On the administrative side of things, we understand that there is work ongoing to present the application forms online with an online reporting tool but the backlog has now been addressed and new applicants should see a far quicker response to the application process.

Carbon3IT Ltd would also like to congratulate the Data Centre Alliance in being awarded "endorser",
I know that the DCA team are very keen to comply with the endorser obligations for trade bodies and indeed steps have been taken to survey the DCA membership, both participant organisations (data centre owners/operators) and endorsers (data centre supply chain/consultancies) to ensure that those organisations are complying with the EUCOC DC (EE) requirements.

On that note, I would like to remind participants and endorsers that you are required to provide evidence of your activities as follows:

Participants
Use the v5 reporting form to provide your last years energy and environmental data and progress against your action plan. this should be sent by the end of February 2015.

Endorsers
Should provide a statement on your "endorsing activities" for 2014, this should include promotion of the EUCOC DC (EE) on your website and other marketing material with links to the EUCOC pages.
Any events you have attended and any training courses or similar you may have run, again this should be provided as soon as possible after the end of 2014.

It is our opinion that the EUCoC DC (EE) does provide everything that any organisation that is seeking to reduce energy consumption and optimise its ICT could possibly need and we remain willing and able to provide insight on how organisations can use the EUCoC DC (EE) to achieve their goals.
You can contact us via our website Carbon3IT Ltd

We've also been busy with our CEEDA activities, conducting one re-assessment and taking discovery calls for new entrants.
We have 3 re-assessments to carry out in Sydney in early November following by a stint at DCD London and then a potential assessment in Hong Kong.

We'll also be attending a HPC event in Coventry in early December, which will probably be our last conference of the year before the Christmas season kicks in, we've been invited to two Christmas  Parties.

So far the calendar for 2015 looks busy with potential trips to South America and Europe.

We may have some exciting news for our next update which will probably be written in Australia.

Finally, we have been working with our partners ICEOTOPE on various things and we can advise that the official launch of the new product will be at Supercomputing in New Orleans in Mid November more info here and their details here and here

ICEOTOPE are still offering free trials of the technology to eligible organisations, so please contact us directly to sort out a trial unit with some engineering support to get the best results.

Until next time.....


Thursday 23 October 2014

Beware of ESOS "Consultants" dabbling in your ICT!

The ESOS (Energy Saving Opportunities Scheme) will come into force in December 2014, this requires all eligible companies to undertake a MANDATORY energy audit this year (December 2014 - December 2015) and then every 4 years.
The register of DECC authorised ESOS Auditors was released on last week and can be found on this link ESOS approved-registers-of-lead-assessors

As can be seen from the list, these are "energy auditors" but they are NOT ICT Energy Auditors, so if they "identify" ICT energy savings, you should be extremely skeptical and call in an auditor who does have experience of auditing ICT systems for energy, these include server rooms, infrastructure and data centre.

Carbon3IT Ltd is currently authorised by the BCS for the Certified Energy Efficient Data Centre Award (CEEDA) this is an evaluation/audit of your data centre to a subset of the EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres (Energy Efficiency) and could be used to satisfy the Environment Agency or an ESOS Lead Auditor that an "ESOS Audit" has been completed.

Our MD is also an ISO50001 Lead Auditor (a prerequisite for an ESOS Auditor)

We also assist the EU-JRC in reviewing applications for the EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres (Energy Efficiency)

Whilst we have a vested interest in highlighting the potential pitfalls of using a non ICT aware ESOS Auditor, we strongly recommend that you pick a specialist ICT auditor to supplement your audit team.

Please visit our website for our contact details.

Tuesday 23 September 2014

The first shots in the Energy Wars!

Yesterday I was invited to a meeting to discuss the provision of IT Energy efficiency training, specifically in the Data Centres sector but also across the rest of IT by senior figures within Government.
In order to paint the impending energy landscape, our government spokesman advised that we are in, not to put to fine a point on it, serious do do.
As previously advised over the last 5 years by ourselves, there is a serious energy gap, this is being made worse by recent unexpected generation shutdowns to whit:

All Nuclear power stations will be shutdown and decommissioned by 2023, even if an extension to operating licences is agreed, they will still be shutdown by 2030. 2 are offline NOW, due to leaks.

The large combustion plant directive puts paid to coal fired power stations by limiting generation to specific levels and all plants to be closed within a period of time (7 stations are already in shutdown)

We are already importing over 10% of our energy needs from France and the Netherlands on a daily basis.

Our Grid needs a large amount of investment.

We face a situation similar to the energy crisis of 1973, when power cuts were the norm, only this time it will be worse.

In 1973, all we really has were lights, fridge and TV, perhaps a radio.
Today we have far far more electrical devices, not just in the home but in business, schools and shops, power cuts will be serious, even after the power comes back on will your systems?

Anyway, enough of the doom, the key to solving the problem is to reduce energy consumption, and this is what the training programme will attempt to achieve.
The training will be split into 4 stages, the first will be targeted to everyone who uses energy, everyone, and will be online.
The second stage will be specific to your organisation, the little things you can do that will save energy and cost.
The third stage will be more prescriptive and be focused on energy efficiency in key industrial sectors, one being IT/Data Centres, others may be retail, water industries, industrial processes etc.
The last stage will be executive oversight, ensuring that the management suite understand, monitor and manage the implementation of energy efficiency measures throughout their companies.

We've been asked to assist in the development of specific IT energy efficiency training programmes with our partners DCA and other DCA members and I will report on this once I have more news (Probably in November)

One thing I really should say is that energy prices will rise by between 20-30% in 2015.

As many of you are aware we only deal with Green IT and Energy Efficiency for Data Centres and have done for 5 years so we are well placed to deal with your queries and can provide other goods and services to reduce overall IT energy consumption.

Tuesday 26 August 2014

Q4 Outlook

Hello again, its the day after the coldest bank holiday in August since records began and still we have some of the legislature in the US denying climate change, it simply is so depressing that some people are willing to jeopardize their childrens and grandchildrens future for short term gain instead of stepping up to the plate and designing solution(s) for the problems we face.

Anyway, enough of that, I've just taken a quick glance at my calendar for the rest of the year and have been pleasantly surprised at the work, conferences and other stuff I got pencilled in!

First up, I shall be attending the CDCAP course in Bury St Edmonds run by C-Net, more details here
Then I'll be off to the Energy Event at the NEC, more details here and probably shooting off to London to be a participant on the latest BCS Green IT SG webinar on the "What is a sustainable Data Centre?" more details here.
The day after I shall be in the DCA team at the 1st DCA Charity Golf day, more details here  

 The following week I'll be in London for DCA and BCS events followed by a BCS CEEDA assessment in Scotland.

The week after I'll be in Brussels for the annual EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres (Energy Efficiency) bets practices update meeting and something with DG Connect.

I'll then be off to London with the family for a very old friends 50th Birthday Party, this will be held at The Valley, home of Charlton Athletic FC, my team since childhood.

At this point my movements are subject to change as I may be in Melbourne, Australia to speak at the DCD converged Event, undertaking 2 possibly 4 BCS CEEDA assessments and visiting Mauritius for the 2nd time this year to undertake some training and possibly attend the BCS Mauritius Branch awards ceremony.

I'll then be back in Brussels for the Green Grid EMEA event on the 28th/29th October

I'll most definitely be in London from the 18th - 21st Nov to chair the DCA energy efficiency and sustainability committee, followed by the DCD London converged event where I shall be speaking and holding 121's with potential BCS CEEDA clients.

Then (If it goes ahead) I'll back back to Mauritius for the 3rd time this year to attend INFOTECH 2014 from the 23rd - 30th November.

Back to the UK for the final event of the year, the DCD awards on the 11th December.

After that little lot I'll be taking an extending Christmas break and will be back in the fold for Jan 2015.

I'm looking forward to it!

Of course I'll be updating the schedule and blogging about green IT and Data Centres as well, so until next time...


Monday 18 August 2014

Mauritius 2014 Part 2

Just a quick recap of our recent trip to Mauritius.
The training went well. could have done with a few more delegates but hey, sometimes you have to work with what you're given!
Please see the previous blog entry for info.

Our last 2 days included. a visit to a potential client, this was for the ICEOTOPE product, apparently the CEO had seen the module I had presented at INFOTECH last year and had requested his guys to look into it.
So, I visited their site and had a look around, I also had the opportunity to visit their shared DR site as well.
I am disappointed to reveal that the PUE fudge reared its ugly head, I was told that the PUE of the site was between 1.5 -1.8, however the raw data indicated that the "real" PUE was considerable higher, it was actually 2.6.
I knew it was going to be a lot higher than they had told me because I could see that not even the most basic of the EUCOC best practices had not been implemented, the temps and the humidity range were also high.

Being a good consultant often means advising customers even if you're not being paid so I sent them a few documents to help them on their way to energy efficiency.

We could easily save them a lot of money by the use of ICEOTOPE and we're currently preparing some costs for them.

The other meetings included a visit to my chums at the National Computer Board, we have a number of potential projects with them in the offing and we'll update you all when the picture becomes clearer.

Later that evening I presented to the BCS Mauritius branch on the topic of "Mauritius' impending energy problem and how ICT can help".
I was actually given a police escort to the venue, but tis not what you think!

I had taken a cab from Port Louis to Rose Hill (up in the highlands) but the cabbie had no idea of the actual location and dropped me in the centre of town, well I don't know if any of my readers have been to Mauritius but it seems that only the main streets are named and it can be quite difficult to find what it is you're looking for, so after about 30 mins wandering the streets of Rose Hill, I decided to go to the police station and ask for directions.
The end result was that the desk sergeant got one of his patrol cars to actually take me to the venue and its a good job that he did, otherwise I'd still be wandering the streets.

I delivered the presentation to about 70 people overall and had quite a few questions afterwards, this was followed by an excellent meal with the BCS Mauritius branch committee, on account of one of their members having a birthday and a short trip home.

The next day involved some 20 hours of travel door to door, but I did have a very nice chap who had been in Madagascar on a field trip as a companion, we chatted for ages about climate change and its impact in Africa.

Here in the UK, we moan about bad weather but at least we have food on our tables, there, bad weather often means that the crops fail and people die.

I'm not going to get involved in the politics of the situation, but it does seem to me that we need to do more, and that the use of technology is going to be key, green technology solutions and energy efficiency in particular.

Its still holiday season so not much seems to be happening, but we have quitre a few interesting projects and assessments to undertake, and the rest of the quarter and Q4 looks very very busy.

Until next time, oh and congratulations to the England Women's Rugby Team, World Cup Winners, and Charlton, beating Wigan in the last minute in the Championship this weekend, C'mon you Reds!

Sunday 10 August 2014

Mauritius - August 2014

I find myself back in the beautiful green island in the South West Indian Ocean, Mauritius, to deliver Green IT and EUCoC training to a mixture of private and public delegates, organised by our newest partner Focus Global Ltd, based on the island.
Focus Global Ltd provide high quality training courses on a variety of topics and further information can be found here.
The training covered the syllabus of the BCS Learning and Development curriculum for the Foundation Certificate in Green IT and the Intermediate Certificate - EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres (Energy Efficiency).
All of the delegates responded well to the training and we incorporated a lot of interactive workshops and joint activities, this was very well received and we'll be amending our courses to include more interactive sessions.
I've extended my stay to undertake a client visit to assist in the possible implementation of the first ICEOTOPE installation in the southern hemisphere and to deliver a presentation to the BCS Mauritius branch on the impending energy crisis on the island and how ICT can assist in mitigation and adaptation activities.

We've also been invited to conduct some more training courses at a later date, and also to provide consultancy services on Green IT and energy efficiency in Data Centres/Cooled Server Rooms.
There are also a number of public tenders that we are evaluating for joint ventures.

We seem to be entering a new era of energy efficient computing with many different opportunities presenting themselves, the first series is that the UK have incorporated a Climate Change Agreement for Data Centres, this scheme allows participants to reduce frictional costs such as the Climate Change Levy and CRC taxation in return for quantifiable energy reductions/operational efficiency in data centres based upon an improvement in baseline PUE.
A sector target of 15% reduction in PUE over the first 5 years has been decided upon.
The scheme will be reviewed in 2020, when a further reduction of 15% over the next five years (subject to confirmation) has been mooted.
The scheme ONLY applies to "wholesale" operators, i.e. those organisations that provide co-location or hosting services to other clients, this means that owner/operator or enterprise data centres are not included, at least for the present, but this could mean a shift from on site data centre operations to colo data centres in order to achieve energy efficiency savings and a reduction in costs, but could also accelerate a shift to "cloud" computing.

The second major event is the Energy Saving Opportunities Scheme (ESOS), this is the UK's interpretation of Article 8 of the EU's Energy Efficiency Directive (Oct 13) and requires mandatory energy audits to commence in April 2015 by most large organisations, this will include reviews of ALL activities undertaken by those organisations and will of course include Green IT and Data Centre energy saving opportunities.
Carbon3IT Ltd have a range of services to meet the new legislative regime, please contact us for more information on how we can assist you.

Finally, our partners Datacenter Dynamics are ramping up BCS CEEDA programme activities in the APAC, CIS and Latam regions and as lead assessors/auditors to the programme we will be undertaking a lot of trips to various data centres both in the UK and those regions, we are going to be extremely busy.

We will be looking to recruit additional experienced personnel to enable us to meet these opportunities so please send us your CV's (send to info'carbon3it.com, and put CV in the subject line) or call us for a chat.

Until next time and remember that Carbon3IT Ltd practices #Green IT in action, we practice what we preach.

Thursday 17 July 2014

ICEOTOPE Free Trials (UK Only)

Some of  you may be aware of the innovative liquid cooled server solution from Sheffield, the ICEOTOPE.
More information on the ICEOTOPE can be found here
We have been aware of this product and its development for the past three years and have recently been given the opportunity to assist them in their future rollout plans.
These include a limited number of free 2 week trials when you can evaluate the product in your own environment and compare it with you current or future technology needs.
We'll even thrown in 2 days of engineering time to assist you and your team work out a full evaluation plan.
There are conditions and these include that you allow us full access to the test data and allow us to publish it.
The trial can be extended at a small cost.
If you'd like to take the opportunity to test and evaluation the "future of the data centre" please get in touch on 01926 843835 or info@carbon3it.com

We are looking forward to your call.

Saturday 12 July 2014

The Final

two games of the world cup will be (have been) played this weekend, at the time of writing we know not the winner, runner up or 3rd/4th places but it matters not, football will be the winner!

Last weekend was a fantastic weekend of sport in the UK and we saw the Netherlands (our team due to England's lacklustre and woeful campaign) win through against Costa Rica to play Argentina, whom they lost to on Wednesday, Lewis Hamilton win the British Grand Prix from 5th on pole and millions of people watching the Tour de France in Yorkshire.

We went up to Manchester on the Monday for the DCA EE&S group meeting, which was well attended and where lots of topics were dicussed (more info can be found on the DCA website), afterwards the delegates were treated to a wide range of ales and beers in a very nice pub and later to a greek meze meal in Princess Street.

The next day the Data Centre Transformation conference was full of interesting stuff, more details on that event will also be published on the DCA website in the near future.

Next week, we'll be in London for the PEDCA update and awaiting full confirmation of our trip to Mauritius (if enough delegates register for the courses, that is!)

So, enjoy the weekend and we'll be back with another blog entry soon.

Saturday 5 July 2014

CCA for Data Centres - Update

Well, its here, its live and its been passed into law.
If you're a co-location or hoisting data centre operator that can fulfill the requirements then you can obtain a reduction on the CCL and exemption from the CRC carbon tax, this is mooted to be worth £170 Million for the UK sector.

Carbon3IT Ltd were invited by DECC to review the information from techUK and the Data Centre Council and to comment on the text of the legislation, as you can imagine we considered this to be an endorsement of our continuing work to promote energy efficiency within the data centre sector, both in the UK and globally.

I was of the opinion that a CCA for Data Centres would be hard if not impossible to achieve so congratulations to the techUK and in particular Emma Fryer for pulling it off.

Now, the hard work begins, applicants will have to provide a years worth of accurate PUE data, and this means sub metering and verifiable to the Green Grid methodology for PUE which will shortly be a ISO standard (another area where Carbon3IT Ltd through our MD being on the BSI IST/46 committee has had input) as well as various limitations on the size of the data centre, its energy consumption, and that it provides wholesale (co-location/hosting) services (i.e that other companies lease or rent space within the facilities)
Enterprise, or companies that own and operate their own facilities will NOT be able to participate at this time, however we do understand that the scheme may be extended to include enterprise facilities at some point in the future.

We also attended the CCA for Data Centres launch party at CBRE last Tuesday on their wonderful roof terrace overlooking St Pauls Cathedral in London

Carbon3IT Ltd are partnering with a number of companies to provide 3rd party verification and consulting to data centre operators that wish to participate in the scheme and as soon as our negotiations are finalised we will post details of our partner companies and contact details.

In the meantime, should you wish to go directly to us for these services please contact us on our usual contact points.

In other news, our MD was invited to speak at the Green Grid event in Japan next week, but due to prior commitments (the DCA Data Centre Transformation Conference in Manchester) we were unable to attend this year, but the invitation is open and we hope to visit soon.

Our MD will also be hosting the 2nd DCA Energy Efficiency and Sustainability Group meeting in Manchester on Monday 7th July, further details on this event can be found here and will be in attendance at the Data Centre Transformation Conference the next day, more details on this event can be found here.

If you're going to to be at either event, we'll see you there.

Our next blog will report on both meetings, until next time, enjoy the remaining quarter finals of the World Cup, the Tour de France, the Wimbledon Ladies Final, the F1 British Grand Prix or whatever sporting event takes your fancy this weekend.


Saturday 21 June 2014

Train in the Sun!

We've been in discussions for quite a while with our Mauritian partners and have finally drawn up the training schedule. more information can be found here (scroll down to the first news entry (21/6/14)).

I've worked out that you could undertake the training in Mauritius for near what you would have to spend to take the training in the EU/UK, and that includes your flights and accommodation, but not your food or any other treats you may wish to take.

So, if you're thinking of taking the BCS L&D training courses in Green IT which leads to the Foundation Certificate in Green IT or the EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres which leads to the Intermediate Certificate - EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres (Energy Efficiency), which I understand will be a mandatory element of the CCA for Data Centres agreement then why not consider taking the courses and enjoying a bit of Sun whilst you're at it.

The training courses cover all you will need to know to take the following exams (exam fees NOT included):

Foundation Certificate in Green IT
Intermediate Certificate - EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres (Energy Efficiency)

Exam vouchers can be procured via the BCS, Chartered Institute for IT directly or through their agents.

Please contact us if you want any further information.




Tuesday 17 June 2014

June Update

Well, the sun has come out at last in the UK, although we understand that this is going to be a temporary state, still at least we have the World Cup to watch and comment upon, even if England didn't do well in their opening match losing 2-1 to Italy.

So, further to our last update we had a very interesting June so far, firstly we completed the first BCS CEEDA report for the facility in Austin Texas, and also prepared the second report for a facility in the UK.
More CEEDA assessments are lined up in the coming months, if you'd like your facility to be assessed please contact us on the numbers above or via our social media feeds and we'll put you in touch with the right person.

We spent a couple of days down at the University of East London with the other members of the EU Horizon 2020 consortium preparing the bid document, lots of fun, deep discussions and writing ensued and the bid has now been submitted.
We await the pleasure of the EU commission team and hope to find out whether the project has funding by the end of the year.
We're also in the process of developing another funding proposal for another data centre related project, more details on that one in our next blog or perhaps the one after.

The BICSI conference speech went well and although this was a cabling crowd, there were some interesting questions from the audience regarding energy efficiency in the data centre.

I was sadly unable to take part in the 3rd BCS Green IT webinar due to a very dodgy internet connection, but by all accounts it went very well and actually overran, we hope to hold a special live round table event on Sustainable Supply Chains in the near future. As always we 'll let you know about it via our social media feeds and other relevant websites.

As always, certification in the data centre is a varied thing, but I attended the DCA certifications event last week, the certification itself is a full assessment of tier, security, energy efficiency and operational excellence and further details on the certification can be found on the DCA website here

We're not involved in assessing the data centres at any part of the process.

Progress on the energy efficiency schemes detailed in our last blog post have yet to be officially released although I do have a meeting scheduled with two of the parties involved with the delivery of the schemes and will report on our progress in future blogs.

As to our next trip overseas, discussions are progressing well with some training courses on Mauritius and hopefully we'll be able to update you all in our next blog, which may be composed whilst on the island!

Whats next, well we have a meeting arranged with ICEOTOPE to formalise our relationship this week and a meeting with some new potential partners next week as well as a BSI training course.
The week after is free except for a datacentre.me networking event which is always a good well run event.

The week after is the DCA Data Centre Transformation Convention in Manchester, further details can be found here. We've put our hands in our pockets and scraped together enough cash for the dinner on the 8th, so if you're already going, come and say hello.

As you can all tell, its been busy and its getting busier, but dont let that put you off from engaging with our services, just drop us an email or tweet us and we'll be back to you asap.

Our services include:

EU Code of Conduct for Data Centres (Energy Efficiency) Application Preparation
Pre BCS CEEDA assessments
Green IT Strategy and Action Plans
Data Centre Energy Efficiency Strategy and Action Plans
Green IT and Energy Efficiency in Data Centres training

We look forward to hearing from you.

Until next time......

Thursday 22 May 2014

A long overdue update

Its been busy busy busy over the last few weeks and we've only just calmed down,  so its time to update you all.
Firstly, we've completed two BCS CEEDA assessments, one in the US, actually Austin in Texas, where one of our existing clients has built a state of the art energy efficient data centre in a colocation facility.
The build has really opened the eyes of the landlord and we hope that some of the technology will be cascaded down into their own new facilities.
I was very impressed with the overall baseline energy efficiency and the willingness of our client to really push the boat out.
For the techies out there, the facility has a PUE of 1.2 which compared to the normal PUE of 2+ for colocation facilities in the US is very very good.
The other CEEDA assessment was in the UK.
Its getting very busy in this area as we have some new and re-assessments lined up in this part of our business and we'll let you know all about them once they've been completed.

We've also been invited to participate in an Horizon2020 EU Funding call, cant say much about it at the present as its still in preparation but once the proposal has been submitted we'll let you know.

We've also been invited to speak at the BICSI UK conference on the 3rd June in Birmingham UK, more details here, the topic will be the impending regulatory landscape for data centres in the UK and EU.
We've been given the morning opening slot to wake everybody up!

The next day will be the 3rd BCS Green IT 2014 webinar on "Sustainable Supply Chains" hosted on the brighttalk platform more details and registration here

Our MD also contributed to another webinar on certification in the data centre more details here
This is a very important and underrated area that data centre operators of all shapes and sizes will need to be aware of, so if you have any questions or would like some further assistance in this area please contact us on our normal numbers or social media channels.

We've been invited to celebrate the launch of the 2nd Green Mountain Data Centre in Norway on the 5th, this is a private event but if you're a follower of Carbon3IT Ltd and have also been invited we'll see you there!

We were invited to the DCS Awards last week by one of our potential partners so thank you for that!

On matters relating to overseas, we have just put forward a proposal to conduct some more Green IT and Energy Efficient data centres training to our friends on Mauritius and that is scheduled to take place sometime in June or July (no details yet) but as soon as we do have them we'll let all our Mauritian friends know.

All in all, things are looking good for us as a business on account of a few interesting regulatory schemes that are impending, the first is the Climate Change Agreement for Data Centres, which is imminent.

The second is the Energy Saving Opportunities Scheme (ESOS) which is in effect the requirement of organisations over a certain size to perform MANDATORY energy audits from April 2015 and then every 4 years (more details to be released by DECC on the 3rd June)

The third, and probably the most important from a data centre perspective is the will of DG Connect (the arm of the European Commission responsible for the digital agenda across the EU) to impose some sort of energy efficiency legislation onto the sector. We'll be keeping abreast of this situation through our connections and as always keep you up to date.

Until next time, enjoy the summer and Football World Cup (good luck to England!)


Thursday 27 March 2014

CSW Broadband Update


We've been asked to cascade this update out to all our Coventry & Warwickshire based contacts.

 

Bringing faster broadband to our rural areas

Project Update March 2014

Please forward this email to your contacts –
we need to spread the word!


If you would like a Word version of this newsletter please email broadband@warwickshire.gov.uk

Sign up to receive this e-newsletter direct to your inbox: http://www.cswbroadband.org.uk/contact-us/subscribe-to-email-newsletter

Topics in this edition:


Exchanges and Cabinets
NGA network coverage map on website
Postcodes

Exchanges and Cabinets

In order to build the fibre network the local exchange must first be upgraded, and then the cabinets that are fed from it. In many cases the exchanges were upgraded as part of the commercial rollout, but the CSW Broadband project includes the upgrade of a number of smaller exchanges.

The list below shows the exchange areas where work is to be carried out in phases over the next 12 months. An exchange area may appear in the list more than once if a number of cabinets are to be upgraded over different phases. The numbers showing against the list of Phase 1 cabinets are the actual cabinet numbers.

We are bringing you this information as quickly as possible and are also working to accelerate the programme where this is feasible. We would therefore suggest that you check the website regularly for the latest updates as now that the rollout has started it will be a rapidly changing landscape. To see the latest updates go to http://www.cswbroadband.org.uk/where-when/rolling-12-month-plan  

To check which cabinet you are connected to please visit www.dslchecker.bt.com which will usually tell you the Exchange and cabinet number (e.g. Address 1PCO HERTFORD ST, COVENTRY, CV1 1AD on Exchange COVENTRY is served by Cabinet 62).

If you do not have a BT telephone number you can enter your address and postcode. However, BT’s electronic records that are searched to produce the postcode and address check results are incomplete and contain errors. The accuracy is improving as the deployment progresses but the current error rate is between one in five and one in ten for the postcode checker.

Note also that the results will only tell you the current availability and will not show what is coming in the future, which is published here.

Health warning!
Please note that this information is based on current understanding and this will change. For example, if the survey finds many blocked cable ducts along the route to connect a Phase One cabinet then it may fall behind and only become Ready For Service (RFS) in a later phase even though the cabinet has been built. There are also exceptional circumstances which would result in a cabinet being removed from the programme.

There are a wide range of variables involved in the rollout of superfast broadband, and even if your local cabinet is successfully upgraded there is no guarantee that you will be able to achieve superfast speeds at your own property. These variables include (but are not limited to):

·       Distance from the cabinet. Broadband speeds can vary over copper connections so the further your distance away from the cabinet the lower the achievable speed will be
·       The quality of your copper connection back to the cabinet
·       Factors within your own property, such as electrical interference or the number of concurrent users
When you order a new broadband service your Internet Service Provider will carry out a test to establish what speeds you are likely to achieve.

Exchange Areas Phase 1
From April 2014
Cabinet Number

ALDERMINSTER
1
Stratford Road Cnr Middlefield Road behind bench, Newbold On Stour
FILLONGLEY
5
Nuneaton Rd outside Woodcroft at Crossroads Tamworth Road, Meriden Road, Coventry Road
HENLEY- IN-ARDEN
1
Warwick Rd Jnc Stratford Rd outside The Bridge House B&B
HENLEY- IN-ARDEN
3
Alcester Road outside Pound Cottage Opposite Bulls Head, Junction with Stratford Rd
HENLEY- IN-ARDEN
7
Inside Wotton Hall Residential Park North end of Wotton Hall by post box
KINETON
2
Bridge Street outside library Cnr Warwick Road
KINETON
3
Warwick Road beside Swan Hotel Cnr Banbury Road
PEBWORTH
1
Long Marston Road Jnc Dorsington Road CV37 8RL in Long Marston
PEBWORTH
2
Lower Quinton - Main Road Jnc Campden Road CV37 8LJ
PEBWORTH
4
Lower Quinton - The Fordway outside 1 Jnc The Fordway CV37 8QP
SNITTERFIELD
1
Snitterfield Road Jnc Church Lane Bearley CV37 0SJ
SNITTERFIELD
2
School Road outside Snitterfield Primary School
SNITTERFIELD
3
Church Road opposite Holly Lodge CV37 0LE
STRATFORD ON AVON
6
Bridge Street in Cooks Alley
STRATFORD ON AVON
9
Evesham Road SW Cnr Shottery Road
STRATFORD ON AVON
15
Jnc Wellesbourne Road, Alveston Lane opposite 3,Alveston Lane
STRATFORD ON AVON
20
Timothy's Bridge Rd Jnc Masons Rd
STRATFORD ON AVON
34
Ely Street between 54 (Queen's Head) and 55
STRATFORD ON AVON
35
Bridge Street outside 22 on roundabout Union Street
STRATFORD ON AVON
36
Outside Rose & Crown, Sheep Street
STRATFORD ON AVON
39
Welcombe Road outside St Gregory's Church
STRATFORD ON AVON
45
Birmingham Road opposite the junction of Western Road
STRATFORD ON AVON
46
Gospel Oak Lane at the junction of Birmingham Road, (opposite The Dun Cow)
STRATFORD ON AVON
47
Timothy Bridge Road (outside Building Profiles Ltd)
STRATFORD ON AVON
51
Arden Street opposite Elms Court
STRATFORD ON AVON
54
Alcester Road at the junction of the Station Entrance (next to Rother House)
STRATFORD ON AVON
62
Birmingham Road between St Peter’s Way and The Avenue
WELLESBOURNE
3
LOXLEY
WELLESBOURNE
4
B4088 Charlecote, South end of house opposite Charlecote Road
WELFORD ON AVON
2
High Street at the junction of Barton Road, Welford-on-Avon
WELFORD ON AVON
3
Church Street at the junction of High Street, Welford-on-Avon

Exchange Areas Phase 2
From July 2014

Exchange Areas Phase 4
From January 2015
Coleshill

Alcester
Leamington Spa

Alderminster
Curdworth

Barford
Kineton

Bidford on Avon


Claverdon
Exchange Areas Phase 3
From October 2014

Coleshill
Alderminster

Curdworth
Atherstone

Dunchurch
Bidford on Avon

Fillongley
Brailes

Haseley Knob
Chapel End

Leamington Spa
Ettington

Moreton Morrell
Harbury

Nuneaton
Harvington

Pailton
Henley- In-Arden

Rugby
Ilmington

Southam
Keresley

Stratford-On-Avon
Knowle

Warwick
Lapworth

Welford- On-Avon
Moreton Morrell


Shipston on Stour


Solihull


Toll Bar


Wolston


 

NGA Network Coverage Map

The latest map on the website shows in broad terms where the CSW Broadband project will be delivering NGA services. At this early stage there is a degree of uncertainty as to where the project is ultimately likely to deploy fibre, but we are bringing you the information as quickly as we can. BT has to carry out a significant amount of planning and on-the-ground surveying work before we can be certain that a location can receive superfast broadband, so the situation shown on this map is likely to change as the rollout progresses or as additional funding becomes available. It is therefore advised that you check the map regularly.

One of the main problems we face is that the data we are given is detailed by postcode, and the maps are generated showing postcode data. However, telecoms infrastructure clearly does not follow postcodes. In fact, as the surveys progress we are finding that we have some postcodes that are served by a number of cabinets, and some cabinets that serve properties in more than one postcode. When you factor in that some properties may be served by exchanges or cabinets that are several miles away you can see the difficulties. Therefore the information on this map is indicative only.

The key to the colours on the map are:

Grey/Black/Hatched Areas: Due for upgrade to superfast speeds by a commercial provider so outside the scope of this project.

White Areas – Awaiting Funding: We are awaiting additional funding to bring these areas up to superfast speeds. In the meantime they will receive the Universal Service Commitment of a minimum 2Mbps, up to 23Mbps (after which it becomes superfast). Speed achieved will depend on geography, topography and existing infrastructure. We are actively seeking additional funding for these areas.

Amber Areas - Future Investigation: We aim to get fibre to 93% of our area, and 91% should achieve superfast speeds, which means a minimum of 24Mbps (although some areas may get much more). As the initial investigative work is completed we will update these areas on the map.

Light Blue Areas - Surveying for faster broadband: Surveys are currently taking place for the installation of fibre to these areas. However, because of the distance from the cabinet it may be that they will not yet receive superfast speeds of more than 24Mbps. As technology improves the speeds available over the fibre in these areas will be likely to increase.

Dark Blue Areas - Surveying for faster broadband and should achieve superfast: Surveys are currently taking place for the installation of fibre to these areas and it is anticipated that they will achieve superfast speeds. Please note that the actual speed achieved at any property can be affected by a number of factors, but it is likely that it will be a minimum of 25Mbps (although some areas may get much more).

It should be noted that this map is high level only as we do not yet have sufficient detail to give more information. The landscape is changing as more surveys are carried out and some areas that are currently under investigation may drop out if they are not deliverable within the timescales or the available budget. The reasons for drop out could be many, but include geography; topography; distance of the existing cabinet from properties; lack of availability of power etc. If an area drops out then another will be brought in for investigation – which is why the maps may change as the project progresses.


Postcodes

We are currently working to produce information about coverage by postcode. The challenge is to present this in a meaningful way that will give an indication of what might be achieved.

It should be noted that one of the main problems we face is that the data we are given is detailed by postcode, but telecoms infrastructure clearly does not follow postcodes. In fact, as the surveys progress we are finding that we have some postcodes that are served by a number of cabinets, and some cabinets that serve properties in more than one postcode. When you factor in the fact that some properties may be served by exchanges or cabinets that are several miles away you can see the difficulties

Questions and Answers


Once my cabinet is connected to the exchange, what then?


That is entirely up to you. We are installing a wholesale network, which means that any Internet Service Provider (ISP) can offer you broadband and there are a wide range of packages available. Do check though that you are able to actually achieve the speeds that are advertised as the geographic issues mentioned above will apply in all cases.


For the BT broadband availability checker visit: http://www.dslchecker.bt.com/adsl/ADSLChecker.TelephoneNumberOutput

So once my new cabinet is in place does that mean I can get superfast broadband?


Not immediately. Standing the cabinet is part of the story, it then has to be connected back to the exchange. Usually this is relatively straightforward, but sometimes there are issues such as blocked ducts. These are more common in the rural areas where the fibre runs back to the exchange are likely to be longer and where vehicles driving over grass verges can cause substantial damage to ducting.

Additional funding has been announced – what will it cover?

The Government has announced additional funds of £3.68m to take superfast broadband coverage up to 95% (our current project will achieve 91%), however this will have to be match funded. In the current economic climate it is not easy to see where the required match funding will come from, but we have recently made a submission through the Coventry and Warwickshire Local Enterprise Partnership European Structural Investment Funds Strategy for a total of £7.85m. Unfortunately the timing of any allocation from EU funds is unlikely to meet the deadline by which we must apply for the Government funding, so we are actively investigating any and all other funding sources.

CSW Broadband will be procuring a partner to take the network to 95% superfast coverage, but are a long way from being able to say which areas will benefit. As with the first contract there will be a procurement exercise and the results of that, and the subsequent investigative works, will determine where the network will be rolled out next.

The team are still actively investigating any and all sources of funding to reach the EU 2020 targets of 100% coverage at a minimum of 30Mbps – which is higher than the current superfast speed of 24Mbps!! The Government has already said that it will launch a £10m fund on 17th March for pilot projects to test new ways of delivering high speed broadband. CSW Broadband will work with suitable local companies in developing applications to this fund and, if successful, in trialling the new technologies in our area.

How is it that some premises will get fibre but not superfast?

By the end of the project, around 93% of premises will have access to fibre, and 91% will have access to speeds of 24Mbps and above (note: both these statistics are the result of work carried out under this project, plus commercial roll-outs). Some premises will be connected to fibre but have speeds of less than 24Mbps due to factors including the distance to their street cabinet. Additionally, some premises connected to fibre will have speeds in excess of 24Mbps as FTTC delivers speeds of up to 80Mbps.

Frequently asked general broadband questions can be found on our website at:



Questions about the contract or rollout can be found at:



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