When officials at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida began planning for a modern data center, they decided from the very beginning they wanted the new facility to meet stringent standards for sustainability and environmental performance.
On Aug. 29, those extra efforts paid off when the Kennedy Data Center (KDC) was awarded LEED Silver Certification by the U.S. Green Building Council.
“This achievement was very important to Kennedy Space Center and especially to the KDC team after more than three years of planning, design and construction to bring the facility all the way up to fully operational,” said NASA’s David Sumner, who served as the data center’s facility project manager throughout its design and construction.
LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. It’s a widely used rating system through which buildings, campuses and even entire communities can be ranked according to factors such as sustainability, water and energy efficiency, greenhouse gas emissions and many more. The four available rating levels are Certified, Silver, Gold and Platinum.
“We strive in all new and renovated facilities to achieve at least a LEED Silver rating,” Sumner explained.
Opened in October 2015, the Kennedy Data Center is a key element in the spaceport’s IT infrastructure. Within its 16,000 square feet, it consolidates computing and data handling capability that previously required five separate data centers totaling about 45,000 square feet. The new facility was built to increase reliability while reducing square footage, energy costs, and operations and maintenance costs.
Ensuring the new data center would meet the requirements for LEED Silver certification wasn’t easy.
“The data center has a very specific purpose, with high power consumption and low personnel usage per square foot of facility, especially compared to a standard office building — and this made LEED certification more challenging to achieve,” Sumner explained.
The team succeeded by starting early. Regional materials and recycled content were used whenever possible. The finished data center boasts optimized energy performance, reduction in water use through low-flow plumbing fixtures and natural irrigation, a sustainable site design, and other innovations, such as “green” housekeeping and pest management.
The team also enlisted the help of LEED-accredited sustainability consultant EXP, which developed, submitted, coordinated and completed the LEED certification documentation required by the U.S. Green Building Council.
The Kennedy Data Center is part of the first phase of the Central Campus currently in development in the heart of the spaceport’s Industrial Area. A new seven-story, 200,000-square-foot headquarters building, already under construction, will anchor the Central Campus and provide office space for about 500 employees. Like the data center, it is designed with sustainability and efficiency in mind.
“After the excitement of completing the KDC construction and having it prove operational, receiving the LEED silver certification was very rewarding,” Sumner said. “It further proves our team built a highly technical, special-operations facility while still maintaining sustainable environmental protection and energy reduction.”