On the east bank of the Mississippi River lie 13,062 acres of the once-active Savanna Army Depot, a former military ammunition production and weapon storage facility in Savanna, Ill. Following its dosing in 2000, the site's 402 munitions storage bunkers are in the process of being converted into self-powered data storage facilities by Savanna Depot Technologies Corp. (SDTC). The company plans to lease the bunkers to financial, government and medical institutions, providing secure, reliable storage for their sensitive data networks.
The igloo-shaped bunkers, positioned hundreds of yards apart across thousands of acres, seem an ideal location to store these critical data center networks. Each igloo features 24-in. thick concrete walls, a layer of ground cover and an implosive design. The bunkers, according to Louis Giokas, chairman and CEO of SDTC, were designed by the military to withstand a direct hit by a 500 lb. bomb, making them able to resist a natural disaster or direct weapons attack.
With the data security issues that have surfaced after 9/11, Giokas said, "it's a good time to be in the business." Companies are looking for secure data storage because they can't afford to be down or lose information, he said. "We're providing a service, space, power, communication, facilities hosting and 24/7 tech coverage," he added. Although, the project is in its infant stages, SDTC has begun conversion of two bunkers, which when fully operational, will be able to function independent of the local utility power grid, drawing from multiple power sources. A 100 kW Elliott microturbine, which will be the main power source at each bunker, is backed up by a diesel powered generator set. SDTC has not selected the gen-set supplier for the entire project, but has installed 300 kW Baldor units at the two initial igloos. Both are powered by 12.7 L six-cylinder Detroit Diesel 6063TK35 diesel engines rated 490 hp.
The concept for the power structure of the bunkers was designed by Preon Inc., Elmhurst, Ill., which signed an agreement with SDTC in September of last year to provide the energy consulting, procurement and maintenance for the project. The design structure for the site, devised by Preon, includes multiple redundant power systems to provide a succession of power backups in the event of a failure. Under the contract, Preon will also provide a 24/7 maintenance service to the site.
According to Giokas, using the main grid for power is not a failsafe option for facilities that require continuous uninterrupted power. Giokas said that because the army depot was powered by onsite generation from its beginnings in 1920, the utility infrastructure to fully power the site is not available. Because of this, SDTC said it will consider using net-metering or electrifying the entire 13,000-plus acres to allow additional development to the site.
Fuel for the microturbines is currently provided by a gas connection to LP tanks located outside of the bunker. But SDTC said it plans to use the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway to ship LP tankers that could be parked on the tracks and piped to the bunkers. The railway is an active line that runs through the depot and was once used to receive and distribute ammunition and supplies to and from the base.
Power management for the project is being provided by Windsor, Colo.-based Encorp, recently selected by SDTC. Encorp's Generator Power Control (GPC) system, along with its paralleling switchgear, will be installed with each microturbine and diesel generator on 21 of the 402 bunkers. This is in addition to Encorp's Virtual Maintenance Monitoring (VMM) software, which will allow SDTC to remotely monitor the entire power infrastructure from a remote location, providing a secure and automated monitoring, alarm and reporting service.
The GPC, according to John Brogan, Encorp's account manager for the project, is really the heart of the entire system, providing the reliable and safe transfer of power between the microturbine or gen-set from the utility grid. "It ties it all together," he said. The system uses an embedded PLC software to communicate through various communication protocols--Lonworks, ethernet and Modbus. It also allows the synchronizing and paralleling of multiple units to the grid.
Encorp's paralleling switchgear will also be installed, paralleling the gen-sets with the utility grid during base load, peak shaving and import/export or zero power transfer modes. In the case of SDTC's bunkers, three Encorp switchgear modules are ganged together to support the multiple power sources. The switchgear features automatic engine sequencing, continuous engine monitoring with e-mail and pager notification and automatic engine shutdown
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