THE National Australia Bank (NAB) expects to save around $22 million over seven years by moving to a new data centre in Melbourne.
According to NAB chief technology officer Denis McGee, the new site will reduce the bank’s carbon footprint by 3200 tonnes.
“The technology savings in kilowatt hours will be 9.1 million over seven years,” he said.
The NAB’s data centre consolidation, which will trim more than 20 facilities into two hubs, will ultimately reduce NAB’s power bill by 40 per cent.
The new data centre at Deer Park, approximately 20 minutes from the city centre, will replace a 25-year-old facility in East Melbourne.
It will complement the bank’s existing facility in Knox, around 27km from the central business district.
McGee said the bank had decommissioned three data centres in the past 12 months.
The scale of the new facility, and the bank’s promise to meticulously manage its power usage, allowed it to negotiate near-wholesale rates directly with the electricity supplier, data centre transformation senior manager Tim Palmer said.
In the case of a power outage, six diesel generators will provide a back-up source. An underground concrete tank holds enough diesel to fuel the engines for three days.
Free cooling will regulate the temperatures at Deer Park for half the year, where ambient air cooler than 30 degrees will be used instead of airconditioning.
