Wells Fargo goes green with Data Center

Case Study: Wells Fargo's Free Data Center Cooling System

Intro:


Bob Culver generated $150,000 in free cooling last year by using water-side economizer technology in the air conditioning system serving Wells Fargo & Co.’s Minneapolis data center. Culver, vice president of technology information group facilities, expects to save double that amount this year and up to $450,000 annually as the bank continues to expand operations in the new, 80,000-square-foot facility. That’s a 15% overall savings on energy use — not bad for an investment that added $1million (about 1%) to total construction costs when the facility was built two years ago. “It’s one of the better decisions we made,” Culver says.

The water-side economizer uses a combination of a cooling tower outside the building and a “shell and tube” heat exchanger inside. For about four months each year, the system can provide water that’s sufficiently chilled by outside air to allow the heat exchanger to directly feed Wells Fargo’s data center with cold air, bypassing the chiller. Savings this year will come from shutting off two chillers that currently feed the data center. Culver expects to add a third chiller in the next few years as the data center expands to full capacity.

Comment: I've been in this data center and it is totally cool in more ways than one!