Data Center Power Featured Articles
Data Center Power Distribution Company Server Technology Powers World's Deepest Cabled Ocean Observatory
By Carrie Schmelkin TMCnet Web Editor
When the University of Hawaii School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology (SOEST) needed a way to power the world’s deepest cabled ocean observatory, it knew it needed a little help.
And, when it decided to re-task an old AT&T (News 
- Alert) voice cable to connect an underwater observatory so that the SOEST people could continuously monitor a spot in the ocean called Station Aloha (22°15’ North, 158° W), SOEST decided to enlist the help of Server Technology (News - Alert).
Server Technology, a company that for over 25 years has provided data center power management solutions, is a leading provider of power distribution products and power monitoring software.
For SOEST, there were a few problems the university was facing including the fact that it was 100 kilometers north of the island of Oahu, and five kilometers deep, which meant that service calls were very difficult to perform. Moreover, even the control systems at the land end of the cable were in a very limited access space that is a cable landing station, according to university officials.
Accordingly, SOEST decided to deploy a Server Technology CW-8H1 IP controllable power distribution unit. With the data center power distribution unit in place, if some of SOEST’s custom software gets into an unknown state and hangs, it does not need to create a special visit request and drive a couple hours, but rather access the Web interface on the PDU and power cycle the computer.
“It sounds simple, but being able to logically tie multiple outlets together, track power usage, and monitor the environment with temp/humidity probes; all translates to uninterrupted data streams to help the scientists of the Aloha Cabled Observatory learn about our changing environment at Station Aloha,” Brian Chee of SOEST said.
For Server Technology, the company was happy to be able to offer some assistance.
Server Technology’s CW-8H1 IP controllable power distribution unit was able to help SOEST tie multiple outlets together, track their power usage, monitor the environment, and remotely manage and reboot the server if needed.
“Server Technology’s Switched 8 units (CW-8H1 IP) were the answer to SOEST’s challenges,” Julie Brown, marketing manager for Server Technology, told TMCnet. “They can remotely manage and reboot the equipment through the cabinet power distribution unit (CDU), get the power and environmental data they need as well as group multiple outlets together.”
Echoed Calvin Nicholson, senior director of Software & Firmware Development for Server Technology, said “It’s great that we could help support the underwater observatory – it’s certainly one of the more unique implementations of our product.”
Carrie Schmelkin is a Web Editor for TMCnet. Previously, she worked as Assistant Editor at the New Canaan Advertiser, a 102-year-old weekly newspaper, covering news and enhancing the publication's social media initiatives. Carrie holds a bachelor's degree in journalism and a bachelor's degree in English from the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.
Edited by Carrie Schmelkin
Data Center Power Resources
Featured White Papers
This article explores the various monitoring systems typically found within the data center ecosystem and how to navigate getting the required power and environmental information needed to make better decisions within your data center facility.
[Read More]RF Code provides an enterprise class, wire-free sensor solution that is ideal for monitoring in real time the environmental conditions in IT dense areas such as data centers and IT closets.
[Read More]Within enterprise data centers, power used for operating the facility, lighting, running IT loads and cooling is the largest operational expense. Numerous papers and articles have been published by The Green Grid, The Uptime Institute, PG&E, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratories and others discussing ways to measure, monitor and increase efficiencies. This paper discusses the effect on efficiency of load balancing across phases in a 3-phase distribution system.
[Read More]