Equinix Design PUE

Equinix has recently adopted more aggressive regional PUE design targets for new sites as well as major expansions. These targets are based on an Average Annual PUE at full load (with redundancy) that meets the definition for PUE Category 3. Our current goals range from 1.29-1.40 and represent an average incremental efficiency gain of 8-10%. For existing sites, Equinix is striving to report PUE Category 1 with IT load readings in kWh taken at the output of the UPS and measured as an annual average.

Power Usage Effectiveness at Equinix

Power usage effectiveness (PUE) is an important industry metric for measuring the energy efficiency of a data center’s infrastructure under normal operating conditions. It’s calculated using the following formula:

Total energy entering the data center

PUE =

Energy used by IT equipment inside the data center

Energy use beyond what's consumed by IT equipment powers essential data center services such as cooling, lighting, power distribution and power conversion.

Evaluating Data Center PUE

PUE helps track power usage trends in an individual facility over time and measures the effects of different design and operational decisions. It’s best used as a facility-specific benchmark, not a numeric basis for comparing different data centers. PUE is affected by site-specific variables, including:

Design, construction and age of the facility

Newer data centers typically have more energy-efficient designs and equipment.

Energy efficiency of IT equipment housed within the facility

Newer servers and machines can often handle greater workloads while drawing less power.

Utilization rate of the data center facility

Densely occupied facilities that house lots of IT equipment will have lower PUEs than facilities still attracting new tenants and ramping up occupancy.

Our Commitment

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Equinix is committed to lowering our PUE through a mix of capital investments, improved design standards, best practices and operational discipline. By maximizing environmental and ambient conditions where possible (such as by using fresh air cooling), we expect to lower our PUE even more.