A map of Equinix's data centers across the Asia Pacific, including Japan facilities
(WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Data center operator Equinix (www.equinix.com) announced on Tuesday that its two data centers in Tokyo, TY1 and TY2, are operating under normal conditions, following the earthquake and tsunami in Japan last Friday.
The 8.9 magnitude earthquake and tsunami has reportedly affected some data centers in the region.
NTT Communications appeared to have lost its IP-VPN connection in the Tohoku region, which subsequently affected some of its services.
Kei Furuta, managing director of Equinix Japan says the company has arranged for priority deliveries of diesel fuel so that both data centers can continue running through the blackout periods that the local utility Tokyo Electric Power plans to implement.
The utility company announced last weekend that it is implementing rolling blackouts to cities in suburban Tokyo for three to six hours daily.
These blackouts are designed to cope with the lack of generating capacity after the earthquake and tsunami damaged nuclear plants in northern Japan.
Equinix says the Japanese government is currently working to ensure that data centers will continue to have power to ensure continous communications services throughout the country.
During these blackout periods, data centers will be required to switch over to backup generators, which will of course mean that operators will need to have a sufficient amount of diesel fuel to power the generators.
“The biggest concern at the moment is power disruption,” says Furuta. “We have fueled the generators at our Tokyo data centers to their full capacity, which will provide emergency backup power in the event of any power disruption. We have a priority contract with our fuel supply company. We are closely monitoring the situation, but depending on future status, they could have to prioritize among the priority contractors, or in an extreme case, the government may have to prioritize the national energy to the devastated area. We do not expect an issue for fuel in the short term, but the mid to long term future is always unknown.”
Furuta also added that the government recognizes the critical role data centers play in maintaining vital services following the disasters.
He says that the Japanese government is “working on prioritizing power and energy supply to data centers which are considered critical information and telecommunication.”
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