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We are committed to keeping the Canberra community fully informed about the Canberra Technology City (CTC) development. This website provides facts about the CTC and the benefits this will bring to the Canberra community and to the country. We trust the following information will help answer any questions you may have about elements of the development.
Letter from incoming CEO ActewAGL
About CTC
Visual Aids
Development News
Fact Sheet
Media Releases
Contact Us
About CTC
What is a data centre?
A data centre is a communications facility used to house computer systems and associated components, such as telecommunications and storage systems. It generally includes redundant or backup power supplies, redundant data communications connections, environmental controls (e.g., air conditioning, fire suppression), and special security devices. Communications in data centres are most often based on networks running the IP protocol suite and contain a set of routers and switches that communicate and transport traffic (data) between the servers and to the outside world.
Cogeneration – Energy efficiency & reduced greenhouse gas emission
To read an article from the Clean Energy Council about cogeneration click here
Cogeneration is the use of an electricity generator to simultaneously generate both electricity and useful heat. Conventional power plants emit the heat created as a byproduct of electricity generation into the environment. Cogeneration captures the byproduct heat for useful purposes. Byproduct heat is also be used in absorption chillers for cooling.
Cogeneration will deliver to the tenants of the CTC project an 80% reduction in emissions based on tried and proven technology and significantly improve the electrical efficiency above existing old data centres in Australia.
Energy efficiency is an environmental, societal and IT economic imperative that business and cannot ignore. The worldwide IT sector is responsible for around 2% of manmade CO2 emissions each year. This is expected to grow substantially as society relies more and more on the service delivered by computers.
The Federal Government's impending introduction of an emissions trading scheme in Australia will cause a significant change in attitude, behaviour and funding to force the IT sector to make progress on energy efficiency. This will apply to Canberra as well as all other major cities in Australia.
A large proportion of the energy used in a data centre drives air-conditioning plant to remove the heat from the computer halls produced by the computer's consumption of electricity. The CTC cogeneration plant will harvest the otherwise wasted exhaust heat of the gas fired turbines and utilise this heat to produce chilled water from absorption chiller plant. These absorption chillers using the exhaust heat are able to produce huge quantities of chilled water at 6 degrees Celsius, ideal to support the entire cooling demands of the data centre. This is a unique feature of the CTC project.
With the cogeneration plant being located on the same campus as the data centres the CTC project will allow major financial institutions and Governments to reduce dramatically their carbon emissions and meet strict targets by relocating their computers to the data centres on the CTC site.
Electrical chillers typically represent 33% of the data centres total electrical requirements as illustrated below. Almost all of this drain on energy is eliminated based on using the chilled water from the cogeneration plant. |
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The chart below demonstrates the significant reduction of 60% in carbon emissions by simply changing fuel sources from coal to natural gas and using cogeneration capability to offset air-conditioning workload at CTC. An additional 20% reduction in emissions is achieved by moving existing computers from old poorly designed and inefficient data centres to the CTC data centres. This will provide an overall reduction of up to 80% in carbon emissions compared with existing data centres in Australia.
The financial and climate change advantages of onsite gas electricity generation and absorption chiller plant are overwhelming. Onsite generation of electricity and chilled water allows the tenants of the CTC data centre to remove their 24 by 7 demand from coal fired power stations around Australia. The emission reductions achieved are a world break through and are illustrated below. |
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Canberra Technology City is an important and strategic investment for Canberra in demonstrating a leadership position to the world, to address the growing community issues of energy efficiency and growing carbon emissions from the ICT sector.
Canberra Technology City will provide Australian governments and corporations with the opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to carbon reduction by relocating their computer systems and staff into the information economy of the ACT.
Ecologically Sustainable Development
Canberra Technology City will provide significant reductions in carbon emissions when compared to existing data centre facilities. The CTC facility will take advantage of the latest innovations in green building to deploy the following technologies:
• combined power and cooling using on-site gas turbines
• free cooling chillers with high COP
• variable speed drives on all pumps and fans
• high frequency lighting ballasts with T5 lamps
• programmable lighting zoning and control
• heat recovery systems on ventilation exhaust air
• highly efficient VRV air conditioning systems for office/amenities areas
• high efficiency UPS systems
• low-energy facade design
• waste management provisions
• reduced infiltration rates
• electrical sub-metering for all major systems
• rainwater harvesting
• grey water re-use for subsoil irrigation.
The combination of the above technologies is anticipated to deliver a 75% reduction in the facility’s carbon footprint[1] by providing a PUE of 1.31.
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| Figure 1 – Combined power and cooling concept |
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The altered Development Application
After listening to issues raised by the community, through extensive consultation and community feedback, it was clear to ActewAGL and Technical Real Estate (TRE) that the community was concerned about the scale of the development, particularly the power station, and associated noise and emissions. Altered development plans submitted to ACTPLA address community concerns, whilst still bringing much need investment to Canberra and meeting the immediate data centre needs of business and Governments. The key changes are reduction in generation capacity, noise emission, plume emission, data centre buildings and land area required for the development.
A key alteration to the proposal is the removal from this site of the 100MW Peaking Power Station, which would be capable of contributing significantly to the back-up power supply needs of the people of the ACT in a major emergency. The peaking power station now will not be built at this location and ActewAGL will assess more appropriate sites. The initial plan was for 28 MW gas turbine generators as a first stage in the development while providing for growth over time. Generation growth will occur at another site. It will mean the Canberra Technology City on this particular site will fulfil stage 1 of the original proposal and will not grow beyond that capacity. Overall production generation capacity has reduced from 210MW to 28MW.
To view the Development Application (DA) with associated reports and drawings, click here. To view Preliminary Assessment (PA) with associated reports and drawings, click here.
Visual Aids
There were several diagrams on display at the Saturday 17 May session which are available below. Also some additional 3D images of the site and surrounding valley are available
• Landscape Master Plan
• Media History
• Valley cross section
• Aerial view from west
• Aerial view from Macarthur
• Ground view from Macarthur
• View from Southwest corner
• View from 500m South
• View from 500m North
• View East along Mugga Lane
• 3D Model Video
• Sound Contour Diagram
Development News
TRE & ActewAGL are pleased to advise that the altered CTC Development Application and Preliminary Assessment have been submitted to the ACT Planning and Land Authority (ACTPLA) for assessment.
Click here to view the Site Master Plan in PDF format.
Click here to select and view the Development Application on ACTPLA’s website.
Click here to select and view the Preliminary Assessment on ACTPLA’s website.
Click here to view the ACTPLA process surrounding the altered DA and PA.
The community consultation period opens 10 June and closes 1 July 2008.
Fact Sheet
To view the Fact Sheet about Canberra Technology City click here
Media Releases
Click here for the Press Release and Media webpage.
Contact Us
If this information has not addressed your questions or concerns please don’t hesitate to contact us on da_info@canberratechnologycity.com.au |
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