By Healthcare Facilities Today

DALLAS — With the market for modular data centers expected to grow by nearly 33 percent each year over the next five years, GE’s Critical Power business (NYSE: GE) is introducing its new PowerMOD containerized power systems platform, speeding data center expansion and increasing energy efficiency and reliability.

The GE PowerMOD modular power container can be configured with a range of critical power protection and efficiency technologies including GE’s automatic transfer switches, switchboards and transformers, along with its new TLE Series uninterruptible power supply (UPS), which provides up to 97 percent power efficiency in double-conversion mode and up to 99 percent efficiency in eBoost or multi-mode operation. GE’s efficient TLE UPS system helps lower system energy expenses and power usage effectiveness (PUE). PowerMOD provides backup critical power from 200 kilowatts (kW) to 1,500 kW in standard design points, for both 50-hertz and 60-hertz configurations.  

As data center owners and operators struggle to expand storage and processing capacity in their fixed brick-and-mortar facilities, they look to modular data centers as a way to build out new capacity. In a survey conducted by the Uptime Institute in 2012, 41 percent of respondents viewed modular “power and cooling blocks” as part of their current data center expansion strategies. GE’s PowerMOD can be deployed in four to five months compared with 24 months for traditional facilities, with capital expense reductions of almost 25 percent. Additionally, operating expenses can be reduced by up to 44 percent through the greater efficiencies of the TLE UPS and the Free-Cooling Economizer—a standard feature in the PowerMOD. Environmental cooling options for the PowerMOD include direct expansion (DX), chilled water and evaporative/adiabatic.

“GE PowerMOD delivers lower total cost of ownership and higher energy efficiency and can be deployed on-site faster than brick-and-motor data centers,” said Jeff Schnitzer, general manager of GE’s Critical Power business. 

According to Liz Cruz, senior analyst in IHS’ data center and critical infrastructure research group (a leading source of information, insight and analytics in the industry), “The market for facility containers, or those that provide the power and cooling infrastructure for data centers, has an attractive future due to increased rack densities, which are causing data centers to run out of power and cooling capacity before IT capacity, presenting a unique market opportunity for facility containers. GE’s entry into the modular data center market with a power supply solution signals widening growth for this segment,” said Liz Cruz, senior analyst in IHS’ data center and critical infrastructure research group.

Together with HP, GE will present a session titled, “Benefits of Fully Modular Data Centers,” at the 7x24 Exchange Fall Conference on Monday, Nov. 18, 2013, in San Antonio, Texas.

About GE’s Critical Power business

GE’s Critical Power business provides mission-critical applications with end-to-end power product and service solutions specifically designed to maximize uptime while improving energy efficiency. The solutions offered by the Critical Power business add to GE’s broader Industrial Solutions portfolio of leading technologies designed for the delivery, management and optimization of electrical power for customers across multiple industries. To learn more about GE’s Critical Power business, visit: www.gecriticalpower.com.

About GE

GE (NYSE: GE) works on things that matter. The best people and the best technologies taking on the toughest challenges. Finding solutions in energy, health and home, transportation and finance. Building, powering, moving and curing the world. Not just imagining. Doing. GE works. For more information, visit the company's website at www.ge.com.

Follow GE Energy Management and its Critical Power business on Twitter @GE_EnergyMgmt and @GEcriticalpower.