Financial Institution Data Centre

Project Specs

Project Location
Toronto, Ontario
Sector
Financial
Project Specs
New construction, 3,000 sq.ft.,
36" high raised floor,
LEED Silver Building

Certifications

usgbc_logo_gray.smaller
LEED Silver
Certified Building

Project Summary

For any financial institution, reliability and security are paramount. Computer Room Services Corporation (CRSC) was approached by this client to design and engineer a facility that would meet the expectations of a Tier III classified data centre in a LEED silver certified building.

Through performing a site audit, growth modeling and power quality analysis, the CRSC data centre designers were able to design a data centre that would meet the clients' current needs while preparing for future growth expectations. For the 3,000 sq.ft. data centre, a 36" raised floor was included in the design to provide sufficient air flow from the CRAC units to the racks, while improving the efficiency of the facility. A hot ailse/cold ailse layout was chosen for delivering the cold air to the front of the racks, while pulling the hot air from the hot aisle to return to the CRAC unit.

The data centre was designed to accommodate 100 racks at 3kw per rack. An N+1 Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) system with dual static switches was included to provide the required back up power and redundancy to ensure the reliability of the data centre. In addition eight RPPs and two PDMs were installed to provide flexible output distribution with high efficiency. Providing back up power is a diesel stand-by generator.

Two redundant outdoor drycoolers with dual pump packages, and 11 downflow glycol-cooled indoor Computer Room Air Conditioning (CRAC) units were installed to maintain a high level of system availability. To enhance system resiliency and flexibility, the cooling infrastructure was designed to allow uninterrupted installation of future CRAC units. The complexity of the project was heightened when determining the best location for the drycoolers. The main building roof was not a suitable alternative as there was no available space. The end solution was to install the dry coolers on a secondary roof which would provide suitable access while not affecting the rain water collection.

Security of the data centre was established with an FM200 clean agent fire suppression system with a pre-action sprinkler system. The system is monitored with branch circuit monitoring and 24/7 off-site support. For overall security, the data centre was designed with diometrics access control to limit access to the facility along with CCTVs, steel mesh re-enforced walls, and perimeter sub-floor steel baffles.