Alibaba launches productive and energy efficient data center

AliCloud, a cloud services division of Alibaba, a Chinese corporation, announced its intention to launch the AliCloud Qiandao Lake Data Center, a “green” data center. This is the eighth data center of the company, and its purpose is to expand the capabilities of Alibaba services, ensuring their normal operation. It was decided to build a data center due to the growth in the number of new users and the development of the general Alibaba infrastructure.



Interestingly, the object will be located on the shores of Lake Qiandaohu , Zheqiang Province, China. The lake is artificial, it was formed in 1959 after the construction of the local hydroelectric station. On the lake there are 1078 islands because of what it received such a name. The total area of ​​the lake is 573 km², volume - 17.8 km³. The total area of ​​the islands is about 86 km². Qiandaohu is a tourist attraction, but now there will be a technological object that is worth seeing - this is AliCloud Qiandao Lake Data Center.





')

Infrastructure and features

The developers of the data center sought to make it as energy efficient and productive as possible in local conditions. The facility has a special monitoring system that allows the data center maintenance personnel to monitor the situation in real time.



Here, the Chinese company plans to implement an interesting project - an economical cooling system in terms of energy consumption, where cold water from the lake will be used. Here, the water is cool for a whole year, and the vast majority of data center systems can be cooled with water. Such a cooling system satisfies about 90% of all object cooling needs. And another 10% are standard technologies that are commonly used in a data center.



Thanks to the implementation of such an idea, the energy consumption of cooling systems was reduced by 80%. Plus, the data center has a minimal environmental impact.



In AliCloud Qiandao Lake Data Center, filtered water from the lake is pumped through all levels of the data center. Then the water enters the 2.5 km canal crossing the local city. In the future, the heated water will be used to heat local households and industrial enterprises located nearby.



It is interesting that solar energy, hydraulics and other innovations will be used here. Thanks to working with renewable energy sources, the energy efficiency ratio ( PUE ) is below 1.3 and the water use efficiency ( WUE ) is below 0.2.







According to the project representative, here every drop of water is used for its intended purpose. In other words, on-site combined technologies are used to increase energy efficiency and, at the same time, improve the performance of the data center.

Technological features of the data center

AliRack 2.0's own racks allow the company to deliver and maintain about 5,000 servers per day, which is 10 times more than with traditional methods. At the same time, the density of servers in the data center is 30% higher than in the traditional one.



The modules used here reduce the term of commissioning (from the moment of the order to the beginning of work) to 45 days. The market average is 4 months.



AliFlash is another development company that meets the needs of Alibaba, plus it works 70% more efficiently than its counterparts.



Currently, Alibaba already has data centers in Beijing, Hangzhou, Qingdao, Chenzhen, Hong Kong and Silicon Valley, plus a data center in Singapore will soon be operational.