We are very excited to announce that our London Central (NLC) facility has once again exceeded expectations in terms of energy efficiency. NLC’s design PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness) is an impressive 1.12, but the annualised real-world PUE for the last 12 months was a staggering 1.09 – an improvement over the already remarkable 1.11 achieved the year prior.

NLC is our facility in Bermondsey, London, which we opened in 2015

For those unfamiliar with the concept of PUE, it is a measure of how much energy a data centre uses for computing compared to how much energy it uses for supporting load, such as cooling, UPS losses, fire systems etc. The goal for data centres is to have the lowest possible PUE, as this indicates the highest level of energy efficiency.

Even just meeting our design PUE would be impressive for a London data centre, but to exceed this by such a significant margin is something we’re hugely proud of.

We have consistently demonstrated our commitment to sustainability and energy efficiency across all aspects of our operation. This latest achievement is a testament to our ongoing efforts to reduce our carbon footprint and promote sustainable practices in the industry.

A real-world PUE of 1.09 ranks among the lowest PUEs reported by data centres worldwide, indicating that the facility is operating with a high level of energy efficiency and with minimal energy waste.

We believe that data centres have a significant role to play in mitigating the impacts of climate change, and we are proud to be leading the way in this effort. Our innovative approach to energy management, combined with our state-of-the-art technology and cutting-edge infrastructure, has enabled us to achieve these outstanding results.

Furthermore, the design PUE of our latest data centre, Netwise London East (NLE), is just 1.05. Reaching a facility’s design PUE target does require a high level of capacity utilisation, which takes time following launch (though helped by our modular design and deployment philosophy), however we couldn’t be more excited to see where our real-world figures lands at NLE in the coming months and years.

NLE opened in 2022, in Canning Town, and is on-track to be one of the most efficient data centres in the world

We would like to take this opportunity to thank our team and our customers for their continued support. We remain committed to driving innovation and sustainability in the data centre industry and look forward to continuing to push the boundaries of what is possible.

January 18, 2023January 18, 2023 by Matt Seaton

A look back at 2022

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2022, data, data center, data centre, end of year, internet, review, summary, year in review

As we head into another exciting year here at Netwise, we would again like to take pause in January to appreciate the year gone by. 2022 was another important year for Netwise, most notably for seeing live client services deployed inside of our new Netwise London East (NLE) data centre for the first time.

We also began development on Phase Two of the London East development cycle in the very same year, just six months after our first anchor tenant entered Data Hall 1.

Pod 2 — Since launching with Pod 1 back in early 2022, a further 28 racks have since joined total capacity in Data Hall 1, taking the space to its 56 enclosure capacity

As seems to be the recurring theme for all Netwise annual retrospectives, 2022 again represents a huge year for us in terms of investments. We’ve continued with our build-out of NLE, following on from Phase One completion earlier in the year.

We’ve seen a fantastic range of new client installations across our entire estate, along with the continued expansion of existing client systems, as our roster of exemplary customers leverage their critical deployments to grow and thrive.

Notable projects from 2022 include:

We soft-opened NLE to client installations – without question, our largest single project achievement in 2022 has been the introduction of live client systems to Data Hall 1 for the first time. You can catch up with the build, from start to finish, on our Build Blog.
We deployed Pod 2, Data Hall 1 at NLE – almost as quickly as we got Pod 1 online, it was time to get Pod 2 deployed to keep pace with new installations at NLE. The containment system for Pod 2 landed with us in the summer, and saw the first new system installed in September, across seven of the 28 new enclosures.
Phase Two of development at NLE began – in the closing stages of the year, we made great strides towards the next stage of development at London East. Data Hall 2 will form the first part of this next phase, with the cooling and extraction pathways now cut into the fabric of the building.
Nathan Desmond joined as Technical Manager – in November, we expanded our team with the joining of Nathan, our new Technical Manager. Expect a full introductory post very soon, to do full justice to this very important milestone.
We expanded our European locations in Marseille and Amsterdam – we’ve deployed new systems in both Marseille, FR and Amsterdam, NL, as we continue to support international clients with their pan-European installations. This takes our global spread of live deployments to 15 locations around the world, from our five PoPs in London, to as far away as Kuwait and Singapore.
NLC exceeded its design PUE, reaching an impressive 1.11 – our London Central facility officially beat its design PUE of 1.12 in early 2022, achieving a real-world annualised PUE of just 1.11 across 12 months. That makes NLC one of the most efficient data centres in the UK (and the world), particularly when coupled with our wider sustainability measures, such as our exclusive purchase of 100% renewable energy. In fact, our own London East facility will likely be the only data centre in the UK to beat this, with a design PUE of just 1.05 – a truly impressive figure.

As is clear to see, 2022 has certainly been dominated with all things NLE, following the soft-opening in May, and the continued investment in the space as we expand into our newest facility.

This doesn’t mean that our London Central facility (NLC) hasn’t seen its fair share of developments alongside, with some key monitoring upgrades deployed onto our generator system, amongst other minor upgrades and improvement works. With NLC running at near-capacity, it’s fantastic to see the natural efficiencies that come with taking a facility to its true design capabilities, a position many data centres rarely reach.

From a wider perspective, we’ve enjoyed another brilliant year in terms of growth, which is driving our rapid expansion into all corners of the new data centre. We pride ourselves on our stable, predictable growth trajectory, which is how we maintain our rock-solid reliability for clients around the world.

2022 also saw unprecedented changes in the global energy market, resulting in a noteworthy upswing in wholesale rates. This has been felt across both domestic and commercial sectors of the market, and has certainly been the most difficult aspect of the year to deal with. The future is still uncertain, however we are seeing positive indicators in the wholesale market which point towards more stability in 2023, which we’re very much hopeful for.

We’re looking ahead to a very exciting year in 2023, as we continue to develop NLE (with be the deployment of Data Halls 2, 3 and 4), and even begin exploring options for campus-level lateral expansion to maintain our ever-important growth ambitions.

Pod 1 — **We look forward to sharing more exciting news with you as we head into 2023.**

November 15, 2022November 15, 2022 by Matt Seaton

London East Phase 2 Development Update 1

We’re now a little way into Phase 2 of development here at our London East data centre, with good progress made across a number of areas throughout the facility since our last update.

The deployment of Pod 2 in Data Hall 1 is well underway, with all racks now positioned and bayed, and with the first tenants in the space already deploying live kit. The complete containment system is now being installed, which will bring the capacity expansion project within Data Hall 1 to a close.

Beyond this, further work has been undertaken as part of the Data Hall 2 expansion project, as we prepare for that space to take initial occupancy in the early stages of 2023.

Aside to the data halls, we’ve also seen developments elsewhere, such as the onlining of our new lift, the installation of our new gates and razor wire system to the rear compound fencing, our new Naturewall welcome screen in the speed gate entranceway, and additional development work undertaken on our customer portal.

The Build and Break Room has also seen notable advances towards its completion and full opening, which is something we’re very excited about. We’ll be continuing to keep this under wraps for the time being, and will publish a separate update about this once ready for use.

We’ll get straight to it with the photos:

Lift — Our personnel lift had to be delayed due to supply issues, so we’re very pleased to now have this in place (as are many of our customers!)

Speedgates — The speed gate access area has had an upgrade, with a new welcome screen mounted to a Naturewall panel – we’re rolling out these acoustic Naturewall panels throughout the facility, in place of the greenwall accents found at London Central, so expect to see further updates on this as they’re installed

Rear — Here we see the newly installed razor wire to the rear of the building, along with post extensions and upgraded security gate – along with the usual auto-tracking PTZ cameras which encircle the external perimeter of all our facilities

We’ve upgraded to the new Nespresso coffee machine and pod system at London East – this machine will be available to clients in the new Build and Break Room very soon

Progress is expected to pick up as we head towards Christmas, with several weeks of additional activity planned for the back half of November, which will focus on continued work inside of Data Hall 1, along with further preparatory works as part of the Data Hall 2 onlining process.

We’ll also be rolling out some new features on our customer portal and back-end systems, with further news to follow in that regard when suitable.

September 7, 2022September 7, 2022 by Matt Seaton

Phase 2 of development begins at London East

In late August, works began full-force on Phase 2 of our London East data centre build project.

While we won’t be publishing a Build Blog to the same degree as Phase 1 – the forthcoming modular roll-out of additional capacity will be less technically involved (and perhaps interesting) than the front-loaded primary build – we are still going to document this process, and put out updates as things progress.

Phase 2 will predominantly focus on two areas of expansion at London East; the deployment of Pod 2 in Data Hall 1 for an immediate capacity boost, and the full deployment of Data Hall 2, for mid-term growth enablement.

This phase is less time-sensitive than the initial build, and will likely be a split development phase as works continue in other areas, including our Build and Break Room and our new personnel lift, both coming in October.

Updates

We’re now a couple of ‘split weeks’ into Phase 2, and have some initial visual updates to share with our readers.

Roof — The first major works as part of Phase 2 involved the addition of the roof extraction cowls over the top of what will become the cold corridor for Data Hall 2

Materials — There are a *lot* of materials and components which go into each data hall – the duct sleeves seen here are for the eventual 28 intake louvres to be cut into the rear of the building for the forthcoming second data hall (of four in this building)

Shipment — The components to make up another three of our containment pods arrived to site this week, allowing for the deployment of another 84 racks across halls 1 and 2

Floor — We’ve also added a couple of other niceties to the facility as part of this phase – here we can see our custom engineered glass floor tiles, which we’re placing in strategic locations to show off the quality of our sub-floor fit-out

We’re extremely pleased with developments so far, despite being early into Phase 2. It is a phase of work which is expected to take us into next year for full realisation, however it will complete in stages. For example, the deployment of Pod 2 in Data Hall 1 will come first, and will be a relatively fast process, as this simply requires the physical construction of the containment pod and the integration of some monitoring and operating systems. The supporting infrastructure is already in place, with no required additions at this stage.

The deployment of Data Hall 2 is a larger operation, as this still requires lots of work under the raised floor to make the space ready for power and connectivity.

We’ll be posting updates to this process as and when suitable progress is made.

July 29, 2022 by Matt Seaton

London East Build Blog – End of Phase One

We’ve taken a much longer break than usual between build blog updates this time around, as we turned focus to the final stages of systems integration and commissioning.

However visual changes have been happening, and in what became the concluding run up to welcoming in our first client deployments to London East, we can relay some of those to you here, and give you a final overview of the facility following Phase One completion.

Weekly overview

With Phase One of the build project now concluded, we’ll be keeping things short and sweet this time, and direct attention to the most recent round of visual evolutions. These now span a period of several months, and in that time we have in fact welcomed our first clients into the new facility, with a very healthy provisioning queue ahead of us.

This is of course a major milestone for us, as we soft-launch the site to clients that have been on the waiting list for entry for quite some time now. Our official public launch is expected in the near future – details to be confirmed.

GRP — Our transformer enclosure is now all back together, including all blockwork and the border, which really completes this side of the front compound

GRP — Having this area completed has enabled clients to migrate into the facility

GRP — As always, the devil is in the detail, and our matching metering enclosure carries the same installation hallmarks as the larger transformer enclosure seen to the side

Gate — Our main vehicle access gate in our front compound is receiving the full automation treatment at the moment, for integration into our access control system and full hands-free operation and locking

Reception — Our reception area has really taken shape now, with the full glazing system now in place

With live client systems now online inside of NLE, both LV A and LV B have their UPS systems delivering conditioned power to critical client deployments

Our LV rooms now have additional floor detail in place, in the form of ribbed rubber safety matting, seen here in LV Room B

As part of our modular data centre design and deployment strategy – which we’ve implemented at all of our bespoke facilities to date – spaces for future capacity deployment can be seen throughout Netwise London East

Our core network is of course fully online and working for clients now deployed at London East, for both transit and backhaul – the B-side of the NLE core and passive infrastructure is seen here, including 144 of the 432 fibre pairs delivered to site by Zayo

Here we see the A-side of the same core and passive communications, which you can see quite clearly is a direct reflection of the B-side – the building is designed as a double-mirror, both left-to-right and top-to-bottom

A wider view of the A-side LV room, which shows the rubber matting route now in place

These custom generator system status screens found in both LV rooms are a fantastic tool for monitoring our various generator tests

Our LV rooms form the beating heart of London East, and we’re extremely proud of how they’ve turned out – these rooms and the equipment within them will support the four data halls in this building for many years to come

Here we have a view of the Build and Break Room, which has since had progress made on the kitchen and lounge segments (not shown here)

With our LV rooms acting as the heart of the building, the data halls are very much the brain, where client deployments reside – this is the view across Data Hall 1, to the occupied Pod 1 containment system, from where Pod 2 will sit very soon

Despite being open to clients for just a few months, Pod 1 now sits at around 56% capacity at the time of publishing this post, which is why the next phase of work in this hall is already underway

This is a view of the A-side ODF in Data Hall 1, with the overhead cable ladder for copper and fibre cross-connects (on the A-side) now beginning to show visible population, as more client systems come online here

The cold aisle containment system at NLE is certainly a step up from NLC, with electric sliding door entry, which can also be deployed with access control for private pod entry (as is the case here)

The new generation of adiabatic coolers have been performing exceptionally well, running at a much lower pressure than the previous generation – despite hitting nearly 40C locally at NLE this month, the CREC system alone dealt with this amazingly well, with the supplementary AC system not called upon once

This view of the rear of our evaporative cooling system in Data Hall 1 shows the scale of the full setup, with the entire rear face of the building acting as a large intake and exit point for the facility – this hall alone has 28 external air intake and filter bays, which helps make this such a low pressure system

All supplementary air conditioning systems, including the secondary system in Data Hall 1 and all building-wide comfort cooling, are now fully online and operational across the board – we only have a small AC plant area in our front compound, as we again lean entirely into super-efficient adiabatic cooling technology here at London East

The main purpose of this post is to present the current state of play at London East following Phase One of construction, which sees Pod 1 online in Data Hall 1, servicing live clients. We will periodically dip back into the Build Blog, to update on individual projects, and of course the move into Phase Two.

We’re dubbing the next phase of development Phase One-Point-Five, and that’s for some of the ancillary areas which had to be pushed back in favour of technical readiness for client systems. This includes customer facing amenities such as the customer break-out kitchen and lounge area, the personnel lift, and a few remaining internal developments such as our new power monitoring system and some customer portal improvements.

What else has been happening?

Since completing on Phase One, introducing our first set of customer deployments, and the forthcoming Phase Two works, we’ve continued with the fit-out of our customer build and break area.

Works are well underway in terms of laying the section of herringbone floor on which the kitchen and lounge areas of the room will be situated, and our high-specification kitchen installation is also in progress.

Here’s a very small sneak peak at progress so far.

A view of the herringbone floor as it is installed over the raised floor tiles in this space

The extra investment in time to install herringbone floor is well worth it, and in keeping with the attention to detail found across all of our facilities

Here we see the very early stages of the kitchen cabinets being installed – things have progressed significantly since, with the worktop and island now in place, however we’ll have a dedicated post for this in due course (it’ll be worth the wait!)

What’s next?

In the immediate term, we’re welcoming a range of clients into Data Hall 1. In fact, we’ve already deployed systems into 17 enclosures, with plenty more lined up for both London East and London Central.

To keep pace with demand looking ahead, and to allow for the next deployment phases, we’ve just had 89x new APC racks delivered to site, which are currently being held in a 60 square metre block in Data Hall 4.

Phase 1.5 is already underway, and expected to last into early autumn. Phase 2 works will begin shortly thereafter, which will see Pod 2 come online, and Data Hall 2 shortly thereafter.

In early July, we spent an entire week on intensive portal development works, as we roll out our brand new client power monitoring platform, client port and bandwidth monitoring re-integration (something that’s been on the cards for a long time now!), and a range of other UX improvements.

We also have some extremely exciting additional developments to pass on very soon, pertaining to our ongoing expansion in all areas. We’re hoping to be able to break silence on this in the coming few weeks.