As part of a major £150,000 investment in a new data centre which can house 4,800 servers the company has installed an eco-friendly air conditioning system which will significantly reduce the company’s energy costs and carbon emissions.
The system from Eco Cooling, which was part-funded with a £36,000 grant from the Carbon Trust, does not use harmful refrigerants by harnessing the natural process of evaporation to provide the cooling.
Managing Director Peter Knapp said: “At a time when many companies are cutting back on capital investment at CCS we believe it is vitally important that we continue to invest in the best IT infrastructure to ensure that existing and new clients benefit from the best possible service.
“Our new data centre in Leeds is as advanced as any in the world. Moreover, while the Eco Cooling systems underscores the CCS’s commitment to the environment it also means that we can significantly reduce our costs which will be passed on to our customers in the corporate sector.”
Data centres are power hungry in two ways – the servers themselves consume large amounts of electricity, and they need constant cooling to prevent overheating. Using the new Eco Cooling system CCS can recover energy, recycling it to further reduce costs.
The coolers operate using only 240v electricity the same amount of electricity as using a couple of bars of on a domestic electric fire and, unlike traditional air conditioning, evaporative cooling uses clean fresh air, allowing odours and bacteria to be expelled naturally through the ventilation system without being re-circulated.
Mr Knapp added: “Our investment in the data centre is all self-funded and we did not to look outside the business for third-party finance. This investment is really a statement of intent on how we plan to grow CCS further in the future.”