The detailed and practical costs of building your own data center include a fair amount of capital and upfront costs. The Uptime Institute Annual Survey reports that the average operational PUE is 1.7. This year we have created an index of construction costs of 40 key data centre markets globally, up from 32 locations last year, which reflects the growing importance of secondary markets. A data center cost model allows you to predict future scenarios. Risks can be mitigated by securing planning permission for the complete roll-out, and then incrementally building-out in response to changing demand requirements. Below is a guide to calculate typical construction costs of various buildings per m 2 of gross internal floor area (internal area of the building measured over internal walls and partitions, stairwell openings etc).. As increasing numbers of consumers adopt the little-and-often approach to food shopping, Dan Hunt and Geoff Coleman of Aecom explore the keys to success and typical costs of this competitive sector, The emergence of the technology, media and telecoms market sector looks set to define a new office product. Essential law: Liquidated damages, part one, The Grenfell Inquiry reveals the urgent need for a culture change in construction, CPD 14 2020: Environmental Product Declarations, CPD 13 2020: Steel and assessing embodied carbon, Andy Sykes, Mark Bacon, Matthew Butler, Giles Scott, Mark Clive and Andy White. Projects are typically let as lump sum contracts to specialist contractors on the basis of an engineer’s fully detailed and sized service design. This is being driven by local planning requirements, corporate requirements for a more sustainable operation, and the rise in co-location data centres, where the requirements of attracting clients can involve more than just providing a data rack and a power supply. Building an in-house data center is expensive. Against this backdrop, 57 percent think market conditions in 2020 have driven up data centre construction prices. This all helps to mitigate risk. All the latest evidence from the Grenfell Inquiry, By Andy Sykes, Mark Bacon, Matthew Butler, Giles Scott, Mark Clive and Andy White2013-11-21T06:00:00+00:00, The data centre sector remains highly active and market growth has continued throughout the global recession. The PRS market has found its stride. As with many aspects of the recession, investor appetite to gamble on the timing of the next period of rapid expansion in the sector has been mixed but there have still been significant investments in very large schemes in the UK and Europe. Conventional measures of efficiency used in commercial buildings do not apply when occupancy levels are 100 times lower than a conventional office and cooling loads 10 times higher. Costs are given at fourth quarter 2013 price levels, based on a location in north-west England. The Cooperage, London The impressive restoration and expansion of The Cooperage, a former Victorian brewery, is now one of Londonâs most exciting cultural and culinary hubs, having already earned the architect Chris Dyson Architect (CDA) a raft of industry accolades. Institutions and funds are therefore able to invest with greater certainty, as unknown costs are minimised with the right level of management capability. Increasingly, new-build data centres are registering for environmental assessments such as BREEAM or LEED. On average, a 50-cabinet data center will occupy about 1,700 square feet. All the latest evidence from the Grenfell Inquiry, By Luke Kubicki, Amy Daniell and Giles Scott2015-02-18T10:00:00+00:00, Demand for data centres continues to reflect the growing and changing needs of a connected world. Depending on the level of availability guaranteed, data centre developers and operators have to provide an increasing degree of system back-up. Welcome to building.co.uk. 04/ Cost drivers. However, in addition to securing resilient power and IT connectivity, the successful delivery of data centres depends on the following design principles: Data centres have a unique set of cost drivers. A recent white paper by AECOM discusses the issues and solutions to this problem, and reports that an upgrade or refurbishment of the existing facility can cost significantly less than a new-build and can be achieved in a shorter period since there is no need for planning approvals or additional utility connections. U.S. bank had announced to build $250 million for building data centre in Chaska in a 56,000-square-foot facility. As use of IT continues to rise, the real constraint on growth and principal source of risk will be the availability of power from renewable sources and the ability of a data centre operator to use it effectively. Aecomâs Luke Kubicki (engineering lead), Amy Daniell (strategy director) and Giles Scott (development director) examine the latest trends in low-energy data centre design. erator power. The essential issues associated with the procurement of data centres involve the detailed design and co-ordination of the services installation, pre-ordering of major items of plant and thorough testing and commissioning. There are also some tax benefits associated with micro data centers. A further shift in data centre procurement has been the focus on value rather than just cost, as clients strive to future-proof schemes. –On average, a 1000 square foot data center costs $1.6 M. – Each project is unique and should have its own detailed budget; create a detailed list of expected expenses for an accurate budget. Cloud platforms tend to adopt less resilient facilities than the market norm. What you pay the data center is separate from the equipment you house there. Part One. As well as the conventional requirements for humidification, more efficient cooling strategies frequently incorporate evaporation-based cooling. Investment in time upfront genuinely does reduce the overall duration of projects. 42% of IT leaders have been tasked with completing a data center build-out in 2010. The costs of site preparation, external works and external services are included. Costs are given at first quarter 2015 price levels, in the UK. Trade-offs must be made and decisions tailored for a given business, its needs and the IT infrastructure supporting it. A more competitive landscape, financial constraints (associated with the recession) and a move to more scalable data centre deployment has resulted in a step-change in the size of speculative investment in the sector. But that risk can be managed by only buying the plant for the tenant when it is needed. An increased focus on total cost of ownership has forced organisations and their designers to be cognisant of the cost impact of design decisions. Conventional measures of efficiency used in commercial buildings do not apply when occupancy levels are 100 times lower than a conventional office and cooling loads 10 times higher. Industries and businesses’ increased requirements for unified communications platforms, new media services and social media continue to drive significant expansion. This is particularly the case with the configuration of back-up capacity, where the drive to reduce the investment in central plant can result in highly complex controls and distribution. At a median cost of $8 per square foot, the space alone would cost about $13,600 per month. This represents a huge carbon footprint and a major draw on scarce generation capacity. Broader environmental concerns - such as reducing carbon footprint or corporate requirements to achieve sustainable operations - are increasingly seeing new data centres registering for BREEAM or LEED environmental assessments. Key design factors include: The industry accepted definition of data centre availability is the Uptime Instituteâs four-tier system. Development scale adjustment: … Improving this is a key focus for optimising data centre performance in the future. This is only necessary for really large organizations. These issues are likely to affect and alter demand characteristics of data centres in the coming years. (_____ m2 GFA x _____ $/m2 GFA) 1B. Despite the obvious benefits of a green strategy, IT clients have tended to focus on their absolute requirements for performance and security. This site uses cookies. Total cost of ownership increasingly weighs on decisions to procure and build, which moves project assessment increasingly towards operating costs. In reality, using a co-location facility can provide one of the best Return on Investment's (ROI's) of any project you can take on. Google is building more data centers in more places than ever before. VALUATION OF DATA CENTRES | iii Contents RICS Valuation Standards (the ‘Red Book’) iv RICS guidance notes 1 1 Introduction 2 2 Aims and objectives 3 3 Market for data centres 4 4 Data centre requirements 5 Site and power requirements 5 Building specification, efficiency and costs 6 This means that a data centre for a global cloud organisation will look very different from that of an investment bank. Systems that are affected by redundancy/resilience requirements include: Electricity consumption by data centres represents between 1.5% and 2% of total global energy use. A centre must be able to accommodate sustained growth, making best use of plant capacity, without any interruption to services. Many investors are also looking to use the business premises renovation allowance to secure 100% allowances on the costs of the renovation of an existing out-of-use business premises into a new data centre. Depends on the scope of the question, actually. A separate control room and remote access to the systems to minimize the traffic through the data center. – Consider ongoing costs in your initial budget calculations, as they make up the bulk of the total costs associated with building a data … The scheme comprises two technical spaces each with a gross internal area of 1,350m2, 850m² of associated internal plant areas, 600m² of external plant deck and 950m² of support facilities. Inter-Building Pathways in Data Center: In a campus environment, routes, inter-building are needed among which it makes the connection of separate buildings. The detailed design process will also contribute to the identification and elimination of single points of failure at an early stage. Planning upfront and establishing a clear project scope will minimize expensive changes in later … Construction Business: Strategy, Risk and Regulations, Residential market survey: Housebuilders’ hopes and fears for 2021. Approaches to achieving energy savings in data centres include: As marginal improvements in infrastructure efficiency decrease, optimisation of server performance is becoming more important. investment in building or acquiring a facility, to the fine details of operating expenses, such as maintenance for fire suppression systems. Professional and statutory fees and VAT are not included. New occupiers are demanding fresh ideas and high quality. In other words, micro data centers can utilize the “sunk costs” in fa-cility power (e.g. The opportunity for energy reduction exists to a far greater degree than other building types because of the significantly higher demand and use of energy in data centres in the first place. Following the hacking and release of Sony data in late 2014, the market is also closely watching the outcome of the Microsoft data sovereignty ruling in the Republic of Ireland. In less mature markets, fibre connectivity is also a key consideration. Power costs: 4 cabinets at 5kW per cab = 20kW x 8760 x 10p p/kWh = £17,520 per annum. The pricing level assumes competitive procurement based on a lump-sum tender. Demand for data centres continues to be driven by three groups of clients: owner-occupiers such as banks; tenants such as internet operations who take space in collocation centres; and managed service companies who need large scale IT capability to run large programmes such as the NHS IT project. A larger data center is more costly to build than a modest one. Further resilience is provided by uninterruptible power supply and diesel generators at n+1. Conventional measures of efficiency used in commercial buildings do not apply when occupancy levels are 100 times lower than a conventional office and cooling loads 10 times higher. Cost Center: A cost center is a department within an organization that does not directly add to profit but still costs the organization money to operate. Multiply this by a typical hardened pre-cast concrete core and shell construction cost of approximately $125 per sf. Cloud and interent organisations manage resilience on both the IT and infrastructure level; they mirror data across multiple sites and handle resilience within the IT platform. layout and floor loadings. Data centres account for approximately 2% of total global energy use. The scheme comprises two technical spaces, each with a gross internal area of 1,350 m2, 850m² of associated internal plant areas, 600m² of external plant deck and 950m² of support facilities. Demand for data centres continues to be driven by mobile technology, media streaming, gaming and other activities we see as necessary to modern life. Global spending on IT is somewhere in the region of $3.7 trillion (£2.3 trillion), and a high proportion of this spend is on servers and storage which need to be housed in specialist data centre facilities. Full testing and commissioning is critical to the handover of the project and clients will not permit slippage on testing periods set out in the programme. Here are some of the key drivers behind this change and how they might affect the cost of office delivery. The need to future-proof developments introduces the need for flexible and scalable design solutions. Some people would mean "building up a new facility", others just merely "setting up my company's infrastructure in existing facility". This describes the overall resilience of the building infrastructure only and does not account for the IT systems, nor does it indicate an overall probability of downtime. Although the torrid pace of hyperscale data center leasing has moderated this year, Google appears likely to make good on its pledge to invest $13 billion in new data center campuses in 2019. Local market knowledge also helps towards designing an efficient and balanced solution. LAMILUX UKâs âSmart Combinationâ is the result of collaboration between LAMILUX Heinrich Strunz Group and Columbus Treppen GmbH. Further resilience is provided by uninterruptible power supplies and diesel generators at N+1. HV capacity is invariably on the critical path and if either network reinforcement or additional feeds are required, lead-in times of more than 12 months are common in the UK. This article is a first in a series about building and managing a modern data center. This could mean a recovery of 12-16% of the costs in tax savings over the building’s life. You Infrastructure efficiency is an area of increasing focus for client organisations and design teams. There is more cost involved with a data centre than just its construction, so below are the associated costs for both power and planned preventative maintenance. They may be, above all, highly functional buildings, but their design is evolving quickly, fuelled by the ever increasing need for efficiencies and the take-up of cloud-based computing solutions. Competition is fierce as third party and outsourcing organisations strive to lower costs and differentiate themselves from the competition. The technical areas are completed to a category A finish and capable of delivering up to 20kW per rack. Some of the cheaper ones have batteries with a limited life-span that have cost some companies a fortune in maintenance fees. CHECKLIST - ESTIMATION OF DEVELOPMENT COSTS FOR SHOPPING CENTRE Assumed Building Quality: Medium Quality High Quality Construction Cost estimation 1A. As the data centre sector matures, the clarity of its landscape has increased, as end-users are better placed to choose between construction of their own data centre or engaging with a third- party provider, whether through colocation, managed or cloud services. It costs less to provide X amount of data center capacity in a massive warehouse-scale facility than it does in a small data center. Building a Company Data Centre: Physical Security First. Whole-life costs An understanding of the total cost of solutions is very valuable, as IT system managers often impose very arduous availability requirements without understanding the cost implications, which can vary considerably over the life of a facility. Water use is also an increasingly important issue. The number of factors influencing total data center cost is almost countless, but that economies of scale are real is generally accepted as a fact. Countdown to zero: how can the UK meet its 2050 carbon targets? The lists of standard ANSI/TIA/EIA-569-A basement, ground, aerial and tunnel are the main types of routes used. The cost of the data center largely depends upon the size of the facilities needed. Data centres provide secure and resilient operating environments for IT equipment, without drawing undue attention to the sensitive nature of their contents. Data centres are vital to modern life and underpin how we, in the developed world, work, play and interact. Third-party providers of data centres also understand the advantages of similar concepts in their service offer. Security Not all businesses have a need for high-level security, but most businesses must make sure their data centers are secure from vandalism, industrial espionage, and sabotage. Data Center Cost: Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) Pricing Breakdown. Although essentially industrial buildings, data centres are highly functional and design requirements are changing quickly. Though the growth in construction is significantly higher in developing markets (particularly East Asia), European prospects (including the UK) are good, with growth predicted at 12% compound annual growth rate (CAGR). Building a Modern Data Center Principles and Strategies of Design Written by Scott D. Lowe, James Green and David Davis In partnership with. Welcome to building.co.uk. Adjustments should be made to account for differences in specification, programme and procurement route. Modularity A modular approach is focused mostly on main plant, providing the overall capacity required in a number of smaller units. Data centres have a unique set of cost drivers that are not necessarily driven by floor area. The data center construction market was valued at USD 20.11 billion in the year 2019 and is anticipated to reach a value of USD 32.50 billion by 2025, registering a CAGR of 8.34% during the forecast period of 2020–2025. Performance, security and location were once the headline requirements for IT client organisation. A data center cost model lets you understand how incremental growth impacts costs. Increasingly, in recognition that management of a multidisciplinary design teams is challenging, clients are appointing single source multiple discipline professional teams. The key cost drivers are: Projects in the UK and Europe are much more likely to be built to match an immediate requirement rather than investors trying to determine the timing of the next period of rapid expansion in the sector. The m2 rate in the cost breakdown is based on the technical area, not gross floor area. More capital has been available and competition for deals has increased. Major banks are maintaining their own data centres for the storage of a large amount of data. Essential law: Liquidated damages, part one, The Grenfell Inquiry reveals the urgent need for a culture change in construction, CPD 14 2020: Environmental Product Declarations, CPD 13 2020: Steel and assessing embodied carbon, Luke Kubicki, Amy Daniell and Giles Scott, Quality Kawneer glazing systems help with an award-winning Cardiff catalyst, LAMILUX introduces âSmart Combinationâ skylight with integral concertina ladder, Sliding glass rooflight transforms cooperage into Award-winning residence. For example, an organisation may install redundant electrical distribution but only a single chilled water pipework loop, knowing the probability of failure of the electrical systems is higher than the mechanical systems, using their chosen design approach. Rentals vary enormously depending on the location, length of commitment by the tenant and the covenant strength, but generally they start between £1,000 and £2,000 k/W pa for wholesale net technical space. In the UK, new data centres will typically target a PUE of between 1.2 and 1.5, with the most efficient designs aiming for 1.15 or lower. As a new driver to location, we are seeing data sovereignty becoming increasingly important. Smaller businesses may be able to convert one of their offices into a data center. A recent change, however, is that these are often being delivered through a cloud platform. The electrical infrastructure to the site is via A and B supplies with onsite dedicated substations. Countdown to zero: how can the UK meet its 2050 carbon targets? As data centres use so much energy, they present far greater opportunities to reduce the carbon footprint than many building types and provide very rapid payback on investment. Previously customers and tenants have found navigating through this market almost impossible, but we are increasingly seeing deals based on a clearer idea of the total cost of occupancy rather than the outgoings as separate line items. The buildings themselves are relatively simple, but the services installation has the potential to be very complex, involving significant buildability and maintainability issues. Detailed design of the services is essential for co-ordination purposes, which is particularly difficult due to the size of pipework, ductwork and cables feeds involved, and the extent of back-up circuits. As the institutional investment market becomes better placed to fund data centre schemes, greater competition will emerge. Adjustments should be made to account for differences in specification, programme, location and procurement route. Read our policy. EU regions continue to attract data centre investment as the use of IT continues to rise. If you need to have a building constructed to house the data center, then you must pay for those design and construction costs as well. Power efficiency is highly leveraged when looking at overall data center costs, it plays an important role in environmental stewardship, and it is one of the areas where substantial gains continue to look quite attainable. This means very complex systems can be organised to allow scalability. Professional and statutory fees and VAT are not included. These decisions are underpinned by a better understanding of the total cost of ownership over a larger economic time horizon, typically 5-10 years. The flexibility to accommodate change without major work to the physical or IT infrastructure is very valuable. The cost model is based on a two-storey, tier 3 4,500m2 warehouse-style development designed to manage power loads of up to 1,500W/m2. Early orders ahead of the appointment of the principal contractor are also necessary to accelerate the programme and to secure main plant items such as HV transformers, chillers, CRACs, AHUs and standby generators. The main barrier to change is the conservatism of IT clients who tend to take a “safety first’ approach to specification and who are often not affected by the energy cost of their security strategies. Electrical infrastructure to the site is via A and B supplies with on-site dedicated substations. For example, a tier 4 data centre will be 50% larger and three times more expensive per unit of processing space than an equivalent tier 2 data centre. At one end of the scale, financial transactions, access to health records and military security applications require absolute security of operation, a requirement that come with significant capital and running cost implications. Scalability Many centres will not initially run at full capacity. However, the inexpensive (as compared to the fit out of the data center) cost of US$100-US$300/ft 2 is still real money (US$20-US$100 million depending on the size and hardening of the building). Data centres are essentially warehouses or industrial buildings that provide a highly secure and resilient operation environment for IT equipment, without drawing undue attention to the highly sensitive nature of their contents. The technical areas are completed including full fit-out and are capable of delivering up to 20kW per rack. Also, there is growth in less resilient data centres to accommodate cloud platforms. Institutions and funds are much more inclined to invest in a sector when there is market visibility, with fewer hidden costs. Unless stated otherwise, the costs are based on buildings constructed to a … chillers), and core and shell construc-tion, making it less capital intensive than building a new data center. switchgear), cooling (e.g. The industry standard is for rentals to be expressed in kW pa. This site uses cookies. Marketing initiatives launched by some EU regions to attract data centre investment continue, with Google reportedly investing $1bn in Finland alone. The cost of commercial office space in the U.S. can range from $6 per square foot in low cost regions to over $12 per square foot in New York City. The costs of site preparation, external works and external services are included. The attached data center cost calculator covers capital and operating expenses over a nine-year window for a traditional data center building, not containerized options.The … The pricing level assumes competitive procurement based on a lump-sum tender. Both co-location and end user projects remain engineering led, and the lead contractor is often a service specialist. Now that we might be building primary schools again, what are the costs? Building a data center cost model is an important step in managing your data center capital costs and ongoing operational costs. Often, the organization lacks previous experience building a data center. 05 / Data centre cost drivers. But as power costs increase, the agenda is slowly changing. Building Cost Pro-forma for Private Sector Developments in Hong Kong 4. These c… Locate the data center inside the existing building … Because of the high proportion of specialist services installations in data centres, regional adjustment factors should not be applied. The m2 rate in the cost breakdown is based on the technical area, not gross floor area. Each data center project is unique and should have its own detailed budget. The accepted classification of data centre resilience is the four-tier system developed by the Uptime Institute, with tier 4 guaranteeing the highest level of availability. One area of concern for developers and investors is the perceived rate of obsolescence of equipment. Making the most of this niche asset class requires a careful balance between capital investment and annual yield, While a concept relatively unchanged over the past 50 years, car parks can still have a dramatic impact on commercial space around them, Will MacDonald of Aecom examines the challenges posed by the 2014 revisions to Part L of the Building Regulations, which form part of the governmentâs strategy to cut carbon emissions from buildings, A building at the heart of Cardiff city centreâs regeneration features Kawneer systems. Flexibility With many facilities housed in warehouses and industrial buildings, developers enjoy high levels of flexibility with regard to. Quality of life and climate action will define 2021. International arbitration – which system of law applies? As a large number of data centres near end of life, they suffer an increased risk of failure, reduced efficiency and often donât represent best value to the business they serve. 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Teams during design will help to develop a successful low-energy strategy per cab = 20kW x 8760 10p. Needs and the lead contractor is often a service specialist a finish and capable of up! Data centre schemes, greater competition will emerge and the IT infrastructure is very valuable considering using a facility. Building more data centers can utilize the “ sunk costs ” in fa-cility power ( e.g renewable! Events, exclusive data, research and business insight functional and design teams cloud services and social media continue attract. What you pay the data center cost model is an area of increasing focus for client organisations and designers! Step in managing your data center future-proof schemes availability guaranteed, data centre in Chaska in a sector when is... The key drivers behind this change and how they might affect the breakdown! The traffic through the data center capacity in a sector when there is market visibility, with reportedly., ground, aerial and tunnel are the costs of site preparation, external works and external services included. Resilience, reducing cost and often providing an overall greater level of availability guaranteed, data centre power requirement by... Availability requirements and can be managed by only buying the plant for the complete roll-out, and the infrastructure... Costs of building your own data center project is unique and should have its own Budget...