What is a Tier certification in a facility?
One of the most important characteristics of a DPC (Data Processing Centers) is that they cannot suffer outages that could harm the servers they host in their facilities. For this reason, many Data Center companies require TIER certifications to demonstrate the capabilities of their Data Processing Centers.
The 4 Tier are a classification used in the DPC field to evaluate the availability and redundancy of the critical infrastructure systems. These levels provide a guideline for measuring the DPC reliability and resilience in the outages or failures event. This classification lists its facilities with a Tier certification between 1 and 4. Tier 1 is the lowest, that means the worst. The 4th, the highest, is the one that identifies the Data Centers that offer a maximum performance and reliability level.
INPRO designs solutions for Data Centers (DPC´s)
Such facilities require design conditions with high security and redundancy level to offer the highest availability rate for uninterrupted backup power supply at diesel gensets, involving multiple diesel tanks, redundancy in paths and components, PLC control distributed but integrated to BMS, management of filtering systems and leak detection.
INPRO, following the criteria of “The Uptime Institute“, designs solutions for this type of infrastructures, as concurrently maintainable site based on the TIER certification.
Tier-1: Basic Site Infrastructure – 99.67% Availability
A Tier 1 DPC has single capacity components and a single non-redundant distribution path serving the computer equipment. It has limited protection against physical events.
Tier 1 Data Center:
- Basic level of infrastructure.
- Single path for power and cooling distribution.
- Limited redundancy, making it susceptible to disruptions during maintenance or failures.
- Typically lacks redundant components and backup systems.
- Uptime: Approximately 99.671% (around 28.8 hours of annual downtime).
ANSI/TIA-942 DESIGN AND SITE CERTIFICATION
ANSI/TIA-942 DESIGN AND SITE CERTIFICATION
Tier-2: Redundant Capacity Component Site Infrastructure – 99.75% Availability
Tier 2 is the certification for a DPC that has redundant capacity components and a single, non-redundant distribution path serving the computer equipment. It has improved protection against physical events.
Tier 2 Data Center:
- Higher level of reliability compared to Tier 1.
- Redundant components for power and cooling.
- Provides some level of backup systems to handle maintenance or failures.
- May experience planned downtime for maintenance.
- Uptime: Approximately 99.741% (around 22 hours of annual downtime).
Tier-3: Concurrently Maintainable Site Infrastructure – 99.982% Availability
In this case, a Tier 3 DPC is a Data Center that has redundant capacity components and multiple independent distribution paths serving the computer equipment. Auto switch control master/slave. Report alarms to BMS.
Tier 3 Data Center:
- Significantly higher availability and reliability than Tier 1 and Tier 2.
- Multiple power and cooling distribution paths.
- N+1 redundancy, meaning there are redundant components to handle failures.
- Maintenance capabilities without disrupting operations.
- Uptime: Approximately 99.982% (around 1.6 hours of annual downtime).
ANSI/TIA-942 DESIGN AND SITE CERTIFICATION
Tier-4: Fault Tolerant Site Infrastructure – 99.995% Availability
A DPC with Tier 4 security has redundant capacity components and multiple independent distribution paths serving the computer equipment which all are active: Full dual active control. Report alarms to BMS -operationally-. The Data Processing Center allows concurrent maintainability and one fault anywhere in the installation without causing downtime. It has protection against almost all physical events.
ANSI/TIA-942 DESIGN AND SITE CERTIFICATION
Tier 4 Data Center:
- Highest level of fault tolerance, redundancy, and availability.
- Multiple active power and cooling distribution paths with fully redundant components.
- Can withstand severe disruptions, including natural disasters.
- Highest level of security and redundancy in all aspects.
- Uptime: Approximately 99.995% (around 26 minutes of annual downtime).
INPRO projects: DPC (Data Processing Center)
At Inpro we desing solutions for DPC projects that include the 4 TIER certification, nationally (Spain) and internationally, the same that we have already implemented in several of our projects carried out in facilities such as:
You can download the 4 TIER diagrams made by the INPRO engineering team, by clicking here:
For more information about our products, services and projects in data centers, you can send an email to info@inprord.com or fill out the following form:
