Prineville Data Center Receives LEED Gold Certification

When we first envisioned our Prineville data center a couple of years ago, we knew we wanted it to be one of the most energy efficient in the world. To achieve this goal, we redesigned our entire physical infrastructure, from grid to gates, with a focus on squeezing out every possible efficiency. The end result: a data center that requires 52 percent less energy to operate than a comparable facility built to code requirements. And now we’re excited to share that all our hard work on the first phase of our Prineville facility has been recognized with LEED® Gold Certification from the U.S. Green Building Council.

 

Innovation was key to achieving our efficiency goals. We are proud to have pioneered several new technologies in the design and operation here, including new energy-efficient server designs and a low-energy evaporative cooling system that makes use of the low-humidity climate of Central Oregon’s high-desert setting to eliminate traditional air conditioners. Overall, the data center uses 38 percent less energy to do the same work as Facebook's existing leased facilities.

 

Here are some of the innovative systems we built that contribute to the data center’s energy efficiency:

  • 100-percent outside air evaporative cooling that requires no cooling towers or chillers. While typical buildings require energy-intensive cooling towers or chillers to keep their interiors at the right temperatures for servers, the Prineville data center has no cooling tower and no chiller. Instead, it uses a highly sophisticated, low-energy design that draws cool outside air from the atmosphere into the building that it then cooled further through evaporation.
  • Custom servers that use less 38 percent less energy and can operate at higher temperatures to reduce mechanical cooling needs.
  • Novel electrical distribution from an on-site substation that eliminates unnecessary losses from transformations and conversions. The process for delivering power from the on-site substation has been simplified, resulting in fewer conversions of power between the substation and the data center, which in turn reduces the amount of energy lost. Typical energy loss during conversion runs at 21 to 27 percent; at Prineville data center the loss is only 7.5 percent. The idea for this new design came from Jay Park, Facebook’s director of data center design engineering. He thought of the new approach in the middle of the night and, with no paper available, sketched it out on a napkin. A photo of the napkin is now framed and hanging in the Prineville facility.

 

Also central to our energy-efficiency gains is the location of the data center itself. With relatively cool temperatures year-round, Prineville provides the ideal climate for the data center.

 

In addition to its energy efficiencies, the Prineville data center includes many other environmental conservation features, both in its construction and in its use. Twenty-seven percent of building materials used came from recycled products, and 30 percent of materials used were locally sourced and manufactured. Ninety-one percent of the wood used was FSC-certified from sustainability-managed forests, and 83 percent of construction waste was recycled or reused, preventing 530 tons of waste from ending up in a landfill.

 

At the completed facility, 100 percent of rainwater is captured and reused for all irrigation and toilet-flushing needs, a savings of 272,000 gallons of municipally treated water per year. A solar energy installation generates an estimated 204,000 kilowatt hours per year, providing electricity to the office areas. The offices are even heated through reuse of heat created by the servers.

 

To learn more about all the environmental and energy efficiencies and see them in action, take this video tour of Prineville Data Center: https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150385588936731