This document summarizes two projects - RECSO and CITS - that aim to help universities better understand the true costs of operating data centers and IT services. RECSO found that energy consumption in higher education is significant and increasing, but costs are often hidden from decision-makers. CITS conducted benchmarking of IT costs (Phase 1) and will now perform in-depth cost analyses to understand cost drivers like hidden energy and infrastructure expenses (Phase 2). The goal is to provide information and incentives to improve efficiency and potentially realize cost savings.

1. Understanding
Data
Centre
Costs:
Lessons
from
e-­‐InfraNet
and
JISC
ac9vi9es
Martin Bennett and Peter James
Responsible Energy Costs (RECSO)
Costing IT Services (CITS)
University of Liverpool, 17th June 2013

2. RECSO
• set
up
under
JISC’s
Greening
ICT
programme
• energy
consump7on
in
HE
labs
and
IT
is
significant
and
increasing,
with
nega7ve
effects:-­‐
– environmental
impacts
espec.
carbon
emissions
– costs
• poten7ally
efficiency-­‐improving
ac7ons
which
managers
and
staff
could
take
exist,
but
are
not
always
actually
taken
• one
possible
reason
–
financial
systems
fail
to
provide:-­‐
– adequate
informa(on
– incen(ves

3. RECSO
• Energy
and
related
costs
(cooling,
power
supply
etc)
are
a
significant
part
of
total
costs
but
are
oMen
‘hidden’
from
decision
makers
• There
are
opportuni7es
to
avoid
a
significant
of
these
costs
through
adop7on
of
good
prac7ce
measures
• There
are
proven
mechanisms
to
drive
improvements
–
shared
savings
schemes,
TCO
including
energy
and
infrastructure
costs,
devolu7on
of
energy
budgets
–
but
not
widely
adopted

4. Cos9ng
IT
Services
(CITS)
Phase
1
• completed,
led
by
Janet
• compara7ve
standardised
benchmarking
of
IT
service
costs
→
X-­‐Ray
tool
Phase
2
• commencing
now,
led
by
Future
Present
• in
depth
cost
analyses
to
support
decisions:-­‐
– central
versus
devolved
services
– in-­‐house
versus
out-­‐sourced
to
cloud
• case
studies,
tools,
financial
literacy
learning
materials
• understanding
the
cost
drivers
of
hidden
overhead
costs,
par7cularly
energy
&
energy-­‐related
infrastructure

5. Amazon
Web
Services

6. Cost
Distor9ons