• About Us
  • Partnership Opportunities
  • Privacy Policy

Data Center Frontier

Charting the future of data centers and cloud computing.

  • Cloud
    • Hyperscale
  • Colo
    • Site Selection
    • Interconnection
  • Energy
    • Sustainability
  • Cooling
  • Technology
    • Internet of Things
    • AI & Machine Learning
    • Edge Computing
    • Virtual Reality
    • Autonomous Cars
    • 5G Wireless
    • Satellites
  • Design
    • Servers
    • Storage
    • Network
  • Voices
  • Podcast
  • White Papers
  • Resources
    • COVID-19
    • Events
    • Newsletter
    • Companies
    • Data Center 101
  • Jobs
You are here: Home / Voices of the Industry / The Importance of Project Buffering & Timing in Data Center Construction

The Importance of Project Buffering & Timing in Data Center Construction

By Voices of the Industry - March 2, 2020

The Importance of Project Buffering & Timing in Data Center Construction

Ashburn, Va., data center construction in 2019. (Photo: Rich Miller)

LinkedinTwitterFacebookSubscribe
Mail

 Zech Connell, Project Development at ProLift Rigging Co., shares insight into the importance of project buffering between equipment procurement and installation in the ever-increasing data center construction race to market.

project buffering

Zech Connell, Project Development, ProLift Rigging Co.

The Cost of Doing Business

I recently read an interesting construction case study by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that discussed the breakdown of data center capital expenditure construction phases during the initial (land acquisition) and development (shell building, electrical and mechanical equipment procurement) to installation (building fit-out). The study sampled over 200 large colocation and enterprise data centers from the 10 largest service and enterprise providers in the United States and concluded their initial capital costs totaled over $8.2 billion.

The study showed that, on average, 6% of that $8.2 billion in initial capital expenditures went towards land acquisition, 21% towards civil and building shell, and a whopping 73% towards purchasing and fitting out the building with mechanical and electrical equipment. And on some major sites, equipment costs ranged between 82-85% of total initial capital investment. For the non-data center construction professionals, that’s a large capex on equipment, i.e. generators, air-conditioning units, transformers, chillers, power distribution units, transfer switches, uninterruptable power supply systems, etc. These infrastructure cost breakdown percentages obviously vary based on your data center size, location, and infrastructure tier requirements, but they are thought-provoking, to say the least.

The law of supply and demand, and the ever-changing regulatory requirements, clearly contributes to the growing equipment capex, but onsite skilled labor contracted to install the equipment is a significant contributing factor. In fact, the American Society of Professional Estimators concluded that out of the 82-85% of initial capital investment on equipment procurement and installation, the equipment purchase accounted for only 25%, and the onsite skilled labor accounted for 75%. That’s staggering.

Inefficiency is Expensive

The most expensive controllable cost for your data center construction site is the skilled onsite labor, especially when site inefficiencies exist. Some major projects could be spending over $60,000 per hour for 500 skilled tradespeople during peak construction. That is $600,000 for a standard 10-hour day for 500 tradespeople. Expense can add up quickly and drastically damage your project’s bottom line if your project isn’t operating at maximum efficiency.

Remember though, your planned site is just a small piece to the booming data center construction market, and you run a high risk of becoming lost in the demand, like the northeastern project, if proper buffering isn’t allocated to your schedule.

When is the last time you remember waiting for a generator or major component to arrive from the manufacturer according to the planned just-in-time delivery schedule? Did it arrive on time? From our experience, we would bet the house on no. Ensuring your project teams are efficient and productive, and that you are not paying for unnecessary labor, means eliminating wait times on equipment deliveries and the need to constantly revise the three day lookahead to account for the inevitable equipment delays. Site inefficiency is the single largest variable for cost increases on a construction build.

Unfortunately, we at ProLift have witnessed the problem of costly inefficiency countless times as we’ve had the privilege of serving the data center market in transportation, storage, and installation of mechanical and electrical equipment. We have worked on many of the largest and most complex data center sites in the United States and understand that no project is immune to the effects of an inefficient process. “Synchronizing the original equipment manufacturers’ (OEM) production and site delivery dates with your critical construction project activities is a challenge,” said Matt Brennan, ProLift President. “OEMs have an ever-increasing demand to produce high quantities of equipment in a short amount of time and then move it off their production line as soon as possible. This often leaves our customers in a very difficult position due to issues with site readiness and inflated emergency storage costs.”

Two Projects, Two Outcomes

In 2019, we had the pleasure of working on a large data center project in the northeastern United States. Top notch client with dedicated and knowledgeable team partners. While the plan was set for a smooth project, it was ultimately delayed two months with dedicated construction resources onsite, including our ProLift team. The delay was due to various equipment not being delivered on time and ended up doubling the scheduled completion time.

Conversely, we also recently worked on another data center project in the southeastern United States. Again, top notch client with dedicated and knowledgeable team partners. This team took a more proactive approach to avoid inefficiencies by allowing us to partner with them utilizing our Project Buffering approach. We ended up receiving and warehousing the equipment as soon as it was ready from the manufacturer while the building construction phase continued to progress. Once the building was completed, we were able to transport and set our entire electrical scope in a short span. The client not only avoided costly delays but also met all scheduled project deadlines.

The northeastern project issue was caused by the manufacturers inability to produce the required equipment, due to high demand, in the amount of time agreed upon which caused the costly two-month schedule delay with dedicated resources onsite. The southeastern project’s use of Project Buffering allowed us to set the entire generator yard and indoor electrical line ups in a short twenty-day span, compared to the three-month planned schedule, placing them ahead of schedule and under budget. Two similar projects in size and planned duration with significantly different outcomes due to the utilization of Project Buffering.

Growth Requires a Proactive Approach

According to a recent datacenter Hawk report, as of Q4 2019, we have 6,000 MW of planned power and almost 36,000,000 square feet of planned space in the top ten United States data center markets alone. We are living in exciting times and have a lot to look forward to. Remember though, your planned site is just a small piece to the booming data center construction market, and you run a high risk of becoming lost in the demand, like the northeastern project, if proper buffering isn’t allocated to your schedule.

Zech Connell is Project Development at ProLift Rigging Co.

LinkedinTwitterFacebookSubscribe
Mail

Tagged With: Data Center Construction, ProLift Rigging Co.

Newsletters

Stay informed: Get our weekly updates!

Are you a new reader? Follow Data Center Frontier on Twitter or Facebook.
voices@richmiller.biz'

About Voices of the Industry

Our Voice of the Industry feature showcases guest articles on thought leadership from sponsors of Data Center Frontier. For more information, see our Voices of the Industry description and guidelines..

Comments

  1. kristina.metzger@cbre.com'Kristina says

    March 16, 2020 at 5:56 pm

    Can you provide additional information about the the U.S. Chamber of Commerce study you referenced above? It would be great to understand the original source document. Thanks!

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter

Voices of the Industry

Overcoming Supply Chain Roadblocks: How to Avoid Disruptions in Your Data Center

Overcoming Supply Chain Roadblocks: How to Avoid Disruptions in Your Data Center The data center industry continues to experience significant global supply chain problems. Brett Williams of Service Express, explores the importance of leveraging the secondary hardware market to overcome supply chain roadblocks.

White Papers

power supplies

Achieving Energy Efficiency Goals in Data Centers

One of the challenges global data centers currently face is the need to meet the increased processing and storage needs of their customers while also making their operations more energy efficient and sustainable. Advanced Energy explores methods global data centers can employ to reduce power consumption and meet energy efficiency goals.

Get this PDF emailed to you.

We always respect your privacy and we never sell or rent our list to third parties. By downloading this White Paper you are agreeing to our terms of service. You can opt out at any time.

DCF Spotlight

Data center modules on display at the recent Edge Congress conference in Austin, Texas. (Photo: Rich Miller)

Edge Computing is Poised to Remake the Data Center Landscape

Data center leaders are investing in edge computing and edge solutions and actively looking at new ways to deploy edge capacity to support evolving business and user requirements.

An aerial view of major facilities in Data Center Alley in Ashburn, Virginia. (Image: Loudoun County)

Northern Virginia Data Center Market: The Focal Point for Cloud Growth

The Northern Virginia data center market is seeing a surge in supply and an even bigger surge in demand. Data Center Frontier explores trends, stats and future expectations for the No. 1 data center market in the country.

See More Spotlight Features

Newsletters

Get the Latest News from Data Center Frontier

Job Listings

RSS Job Openings | Pkaza Critical Facilities Recruiting

  • Critical Power Energy Manager - Data Center Development - Ashburn, VA
  • Site Development Manager - Data Center - Ashburn, VA
  • Data Center Facility Operations Director - Chicago, IL
  • Electrical Engineer - Senior - Dallas, TX
  • Mechanical Commissioning Engineer - Calgary, Alberta

See More Jobs

Data Center 101

Data Center 101: Mastering the Basics of the Data Center Industry

Data Center 101: Mastering the Basics of the Data Center Industry

Data Center Frontier, in partnership with Open Spectrum, brings our readers a series that provides an introductory guidebook to the ins and outs of the data center and colocation industry. Think power systems, cooling, solutions, data center contracts and more. The Data Center 101 Special Report series is directed to those new to the industry, or those of our readers who need to brush up on the basics.

  • Data Center Power
  • Data Center Cooling
  • Strategies for Data Center Location
  • Data Center Pricing Negotiating
  • Cloud Computing

See More Data center 101 Topics

About Us

Charting the future of data centers and cloud computing. We write about what’s next for the Internet, and the innovations that will take us there. We tell the story of the digital economy through the data center facilities that power cloud computing and the people who build them. Read more ...
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter

About Our Founder

Data Center Frontier is edited by Rich Miller, the data center industry’s most experienced journalist. For more than 20 years, Rich has profiled the key role played by data centers in the Internet revolution. Meet the DCF team.

TOPICS

  • 5G Wireless
  • Cloud
  • Colo
  • Connected Cars
  • Cooling
  • Cornerstone
  • Coronavirus
  • Design
  • Edge Computing
  • Energy
  • Executive Roundtable
  • Featured
  • Finance
  • Hyperscale
  • Interconnection
  • Internet of Things
  • Machine Learning
  • Network
  • Podcast
  • Servers
  • Site Selection
  • Social Business
  • Special Reports
  • Storage
  • Sustainability
  • Videos
  • Virtual Reality
  • Voices of the Industry
  • Webinar
  • White Paper

Copyright Data Center Frontier LLC © 2022