Infrastructure Improvements at Intesa Sanpaolo Data Center in Parma, Italy, Increase Operational and Energy Efficiency

Long gone are the days of paper deposit books and hand written banking records, replaced instead by high-tech computerized data centers which make data readily available to allow banks to move at the speed of today's global business environment. While data centers have revolutionized the way businesses store and access information,  the data servers themselves often consume a tremendous amount of energy. 

As one of the top banks in the Euro Zone, Intesa Sanpaolo  has upgraded the infrastructure at its data center in Parma, Italy to increase energy and operational efficiency.  Recent energy savings improvements will provide reliable, efficient and capable cooling critical to the data center environment.

The upgrades are also designed to meet sustainability standards and are part of the Intesa Sanpaolo commitment to environmental stewardship and the journey to reach a high performance building outcome.

Audit Identifies Energy Conservation Measures
Intesa Sanpaolo undertook the improvements in order to reflect their corporate commitment to environmental responsibility as well as to increase energy efficiency in their mission-critical data centers. 

The journey towards a high performance building outcome started with a two-month study of the data center buildings, during which Trane experts monitored temperatures and chiller load. The audit revealed that cooling system operation was not optimized for efficiency, leading the chillers to operate at 50 percent load. Based on these results, bank leaders selected the energy conservation measures that best met their needs while improving energy efficiency and sustainability.

Intesa Sanpaolo Implements Sustainable, Energy Efficient Solutions
Upgrades included replacing two low-efficiency 400 kilowatt (kW) air-cooled chillers with one high-efficiency 1,000 kW water-cooled system. A Tracer Summit™ chiller plant management system was installed to control 7,500 kW of cooling production and distribution. The control system reduced the number of chillers required to efficiently operate the chiller plant. 

Intesa Sanpaolo leaders also introduced an ongoing maintenance contract in addition to predictive and preventive services provided by an offering called Trane Care™. The implemented maintenance and service programs help ensure that the energy-efficient and environmentally responsible systems keep running at optimum performance.

The Trane Care services include Adiabatic Cooling which increases heating, ventilation and air conditioning system reliability and efficiency by decreasing the temperature of the air entering the coil. Vibration analysis identifies any change in the vibration signatures of rotating components – providing fast diagnosis of challenges requiring attention such as bearing wear or shaft imbalance.

Unacceptable wear conditions also will be evident in oil characteristics such as moisture, acidity and metal concentration. Regular oil analysis, another aspect of predictive maintenance, is done so that minor challenges can be detected and repaired to ensure ongoing optimized performance.

Trane Solutions Garner Results for Intesa Sanpaolo
The improvements, completed in 2011, are expected to have a three-year payback period. The system upgrade also provides reliable, efficient and capable cooling critical to the data center environment. The improvements to the facility’s chilled water plant are expected to increase energy efficiency by 16 percent. 

The completed projects are a key step in creating high performance buildings, which are safe, comfortable and efficient. They meet specific standards for energy and water use, system reliability and uptime, environmental compliance and occupant comfort and safety.

High performance buildings help owners and occupants achieve their business missions by using design and operating standards that are created, measured and continually validated to get desired outcomes within specified tolerances.