Earlier this week we noted that engineers will be performing maintenance this weekend to resolve an issue with the interim generators that have been powering Fisher Plaza East since the big Internet hub was hit by a fire at the beginning of the month. Several readers raised red flags, in email and comments, about the plan to temporarily reduce cooling capacity as part of the process.
Michael Smith, chief technical officer of colocation company Adhost, which operates at Fisher Plaza, offered this response via email and on the company's blog. (For illustration, also see this Adhost diagram of its Fisher Plaza East data center, from an earlier Adhost post.)
I'm only in a position to speak about the maintenance announcement you quoted as it pertains to Adhost customers. Every Fisher Plaza East tenant will have a bit of a different take on the event depending upon the configuration of the equipment in their own space. One thing that I can say is that the fundamental cooling systems for Plaza East will not be affected during the window.
Adhost will have two brief periods where we have reduced cooling capacity in our Plaza East data center. We have 4 separate Computer Room Air Conditioning (CRAC) units in our facility. Two have power fed from one riser and two are fed from a different riser. During the maintenance window, power will be interrupted to each of the risers that feed the CRAC units for approximately 30 minutes each.
Before each riser outage, the data center will be cooled to 65 degrees. In the past, we have seen the temperature in the data center raise less than 5 degrees during this type of events. As such, we are confident the temperature in the data center will remain well within tolerances during the event.
The rundown of the event is:
1) Cool data center to 65 degrees.
2) Perform maintenance on Lights and Power Riser - 2 CRAC units off line.
3) Re-cool data center to 65 degrees.
4) Perform maintenance on Mechanical Riser - 2 CRAC units off line.
5) Re-cool data center to 65 degrees.
6) Perform maintenance on Technical Riser - no Adhost equipment affected.
It should be noted that Plaza East and Plaza West are completely discrete buildings with completely discrete cooling and electrical plants serving them. Because of this, our Plaza West data center was not affected by any of the events of the last month, and will also not be affected by this coming maintenance window.
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