Study reveals North American data centre costs

The study analysed annual costs for 41 North American data centres. Costs were reported by participating organisations in four categories: amortised plant, amortised IT assets, operating and energy. In addition, participating organisations reported on IT load, number of racks, average rack density and data centre square footage. Using this data, the Ponemon Institute calculated an average cost to support 1kW of compute capacity for each of five data centre size ranges. Major findings from the study include:

• Average annual cost/kW range from $5,467 for data centres over 50,000 square feet to $26,495 for data centres between 500 and 5,000 square feet.
• Cost/kW decreases as data centre size increases, with the largest decrease occurring from the 500 to 5,000 square foot range to the 5,001 to 10,000 square foot range (64%). Costs continued to decline as data centre size increased:
  • In the 10,001 to 25,000 square foot range, cost/kW were 47% lower than in the 5,001 to 10,000 square foot range;
  • In the 25,001 to 50,000 square foot range, cost/kw were 23% lower than in the 10,001 to 25,000 square foot range;
  • In the over 50,000 square foot range, cost/kW were 21% lower than costs in the 25,001 to 50,000 square foot range.
• Economies of scale were observed in all four cost categories. Energy costs experienced the largest decrease, with a 180% difference between energy costs/kW for data centres in the smallest size range compared to the largest. Operating costs showed a 129% difference per kW in the largest data centres compared to those in the 500 to 5,000 square foot range.
• Operating costs account for the largest percentage of data centre costs across all size ranges, followed by energy costs. Energy and operating costs together account for 80% or more of annual data centre costs.

• Cost/kW decreases with rack density. Data centres with an average rack density of 8.5kW had a cost/kW 68% lower than data centres with an average rack density of 4.5kW.

Peter Panfil, Vice President, Global Power, Emerson Network Power, commented: “With the variety of outsourcing options available today, it’s more important than ever for data centre operators to understand the costs associated with supporting compute capacity and the major components of those costs. This report provides a template for data centre operators to get a handle on their costs and make informed decisions about future outsourcing, while evaluating technologies and best practices that can lower their costs.”

This is the fourth volume in a series research reports from Ponemon and Emerson Network Power providing industry benchmarks and insight into the key challenges and decision points organisations face as they construct an IT infrastructure to support internal users, partners, suppliers and customers in the digital age.All the full reports in the Benchmark Series are available here.