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Hardware Technology

Looking for a Better Back-Up Power Solution? 67

Posted by Cliff from the find-a-better-way-to-recycle-old-batters dept.
ThisIsFred asks: "I maintain a small network (about 1500 users, 9 servers in four locations), and happen to be in an area where the power company's quality of service could be better. Reliability has been slowly improving over the past few years, but we still experience dozens of outages during the course of the year. Unfortunately, all of our un-interruptible power supplies give in after about two years of service, regardless of the brand I buy. I have stacks of lead-acid batteries waiting to get hauled away by a subcontractor licensed to dispose of hazardous materials. This is an expensive service, my employer doesn't want to allocate funds for it every two years. I don't like having to give up space for the storage of dead batteries, and I don't like wasting my time replacing them. Should my employer be responsible for the disposal fees? Shouldn't vendors selling new UPS units be legally required to take back old batteries, like with auto batteries? And what sort of solution should I be looking at that is lower maintenance? Currently I am using smaller, standalone units (1400 VA), because it is really hard for me to secure the funds for something more expensive. I'd like to see what other folks do. I trust examples based on Slashdot's real experience more than some vendor's sales pitch. I need to put together a good argument for the next budget review."
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Looking for a Better Back-Up Power Solution? More

Looking for a Better Back-Up Power Solution?

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  • generators (Score:2, Interesting)

    by nonyah ( 738723 )
    once the company realizes that keeping the servers powered 24x7 regardless of cost is important push them to auto on generators. We have one here, power went out and the only light on in our section of the grid was our sign. We instantly turned around and spun it as uptime is important to our customers etc...

    • You still have to have a UPS to cover the time between the power outage and the time the generators are spooled up and producing power.
    • If you have a good electrician and know how much power you use you can probably find a generator that will give the power you need to keep your office running. With it properly wired in you can use a switch to transfer the power from one source to the generator. And the UPS's only need to be on for a couple of minutes while the generator is started and power is switched to it.

      Or you can plug your UPS into itself so the UPS will keep its charge while running your systems. (This will not work, it is only a
    • This is what our company does. We bought our generator for Y2K. Turns out, we didn't need it then.. We did need it last year during the summer time, when the east coast electric grid was toast. A slight dimming of the lights, and you can hear the roar of the diesel generator start up. Half an hour later, the power came back on, and the generator shut itself down. The UPSs were only in action for a couple of minutes.

      Generators aren't cheap, but they're not incredibly expesive, either, when you factor

  • Hauled away? Battery stores must accept (Score:4, Informative)

    by jcwren ( 166164 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @08:22PM (#8527095) Homepage

    I don't know how many batteries you have, but here in Georgia, battery distributors (Voltex, Interstate, etc) are *required* to accept batteries for disposal, at no charge. In fact, at places like Sears, they charge you a core charge if you don't bring a battery in. Something like $7.

    You might have to pay someone to haul them to the distributor, but that's just a labor charge.

  • Options (Score:5, Informative)

    by linuxwrangler ( 582055 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @08:41PM (#8527270)
    First, your employer will be responsible for the fees. They may be charged up-front as an included part of the cost (and hope the company is still around when you need to dispose of the batteries) or they will be charged at the end.

    Second, some manufacturers do take back the battery. APC includes a pre-paid UPS return for spent batteries. I don't know if it's true for every battery they sell but it is for all I've looked at.

    Third, many recyclers take batteries. My city recycling center has a place to recycle lead-acid batteries for free.

    Remember that deep-discharging is very hard on lead-acid. If you only need to prevent data loss then set up a quick auto shutdown on the UPS protected machines. If you need long run time consider an extended-run UPS with a large enough battery that they don't end up deep discharging. (I know, they won't spring for the $$$)

    Alternately, get some sort of generator that fits your situation so the UPS is only running a short time and not deep discharging. (I know, they won't spring for the $$$)

    You may want to review the OSHA and environmental laws - not to be a whistle blower but just to point out the potential risk of keeping stacks of dead lead-acid batteries around. We have to include ours on an annual report to the city.

    Although you (or most likely "they") won't like the answers all you can do is document the frequency of power failure, the resulting annual costs, backup options and associated costs and any relevant regulations of which you are aware. (I just found out we had to add a backup battery to our PBX due to an employment regulation requiring access to 911 even in a power outage.)

    They may not decide (their job based on your input combined with other knowledge) to give you what you want but you will have done your job.

    • Remember that deep-discharging is very hard on lead-acid.
      So is chronic over-charging, which depletes the electrolyte. The UPS mfgr has no real motive to optimize the charging systems (hey, if they sell more UPSs when people only need new batteries, they make more money) and it is contrary to the purpose of a UPS to cycle the battery at intervals to determine capacity.

      What you might want for this is external batteries. More on this in another post, maybe.

      • For cheaper, smaller units, you are absolutely right. UPS manufacturers want to sell multiple units over a period of time, not just one reliabile system. However, at the high end (not companies, but products), there is more of a focus on reliability and proper charging. We have a nice UPS for the original poster's purposes in our server room. It uses 12 car-sized batteries, and is packaged as a two-cabinet system, with the batteries in the lower cabinet, and a big-ass switch on the upper cabinet (as wel
  • at least that's how it goes here(generally)... ..but then again I'm in Finland.

    how hard can it be to check from the local environment activists whats the state of affairs in your local country/state? not that hard. please do it.

    once again you'll only get the answers that slashdotters think that the state of the affairs SHOULD be, not necessarely what they are in reality.

  • 48Volts DC (Score:3, Interesting)

    by bluGill ( 862 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @08:45PM (#8527321)

    The phone company uses 48 volt DC batteries for all their comptuters. For this reason most equipment intended for the server room has the option of either AC (120/220V,50/60hz), or DC (48 volts) power supplies. Good batteries will last for years in this application. This system when done properly will run for days without any Mains power, and you are connected directly to the batteries at all time so there is no switching issues.

    Note that you won't save money in the short run. However if your power is as bad as you say it might in the long run. In any case it is far more dangerious than normal mains power, despite less voltage. Still when 99.999% reliability isn't good enough it is your only choice.

    As my dad always said, good ideas cost money.

    • My company designs and manufactures power systems for a wide range of applications.

      We focus on Telco, but have AC systems and scale up very, very large.

      Check out some of our products, you can contact our sales department for complete custom design services, priced to fit your budget.

      Battery Systems [magnetektelecom.com]

      We can take any number of batteries, and match it with the right sized UPS to give you as much runtime as you want. We can even come out and bus your server room.

      (Jeez, I should be a salesman!)

      -DF

  • Damn, I recycle them for cash (Score:4, Informative)

    by way2trivial ( 601132 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @08:47PM (#8527334) Homepage Journal
    Around here, they pay for Lead Acid batteries at recycling yards..

    I filled my truck bed, drove 30 miles, and got $40.00.. (paid for my gas and lunch and a bit more to boot)

    • Re:Damn, I recycle them for cash (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I also know of a recycle center that will give me $1 for each lead acid battery that I take in, regardless of what kind.

      My advice, start contacting recycle centers. Lead Acid batteries are worth money and you should not pay to have them disposed of. I am sure that the disposal company that you pay just sells them to a recycle center.

  • Options (Score:3, Insightful)

    by R2.0 ( 532027 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @08:47PM (#8527338)
    1: Have you looked into refurbishing the batteries? Type "Battery Desulphation" into Google, and you migh find some ways to re-use the batteries you got.

    2: Hazardous waste disposal fees? Bullshit. Batteries are chock full of recyclable lead, and should NEVER be "disposed of" except to make new batteries. Look up "recycling, batteries" in your local yellow pages, and I think you may have some luck. Definitely think local on this - shipping any distance will kill you.

    3: Having dismissed the whole "hazardous waste" thing above, I will now state that batteries are indeed hazardous. Or at least not something you want just sitting around. Your boss is being foolish if he thinks that by "not budgeting" for disposal, that makes the issue go away. Batteries can leak acid and give off explosive hydrogen. If something bad happens, your Boss will like paying the cost of that problem even less than your current problem.
    • Batteries can leak acid and give off explosive hydrogen.

      Making hydrogen explode is difficult. The danger of it happening by accident is probably less than the danger of an earthquake knocking over a stack of batteries and causing injury by spilling acid on the floor.
      • Making hydrogen explode is difficult.

        Tell that to the people who were on board the Hindenberg...
        • Tell that to the people who were on board the Hindenberg...

          Why? The Hindenberg didn't explode.
          • >>Tell that to the people who were on board the Hindenberg...

            >Why? The Hindenberg didn't explode.

            And hydrogen didn't cause the fire. The hydrogen barely even contributed to it until most of the ship had already burned.

            Now, if you pre-mix two parts hydrogen to one part oxygen... the smallest spark will make a big boom.
            - Peter
      • "Making hydrogen explode is difficult."

        But making the battery explode is easy.

  • I give my batteries to an auto-repair garage and he gets PAID to give them to someone else.

    So you're getting skrewed.

    And as far as the 2 year problem... I replace all batteries once a year. Its just the way it is. To make it easier on yourself just try using UPS units with larger batteries (less number of batteries but larger units).
  • one thing: how dead are the batteries? if they'll hold any charge at all, you may just be able to sell them on ebay, make a few bucks. at least you may have a bit more cash to spend on the disposall of the really dead batteries. one other hting a friend of mine does is wire his ups's to deep cycle car batteries, they don't mind deep discharging , and you can almost always return the dead ones after you buy replacements, also, they'll increase the uptime of your ups (he has four deep cycles which will run hi

  • UPS (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I remember seeing some UPS's that didn't use batteries, they used a rotating mass to store energy. I don't remember who made them or how good they worked but do remember seeing them in a catalog. I'm sure a little googling with the right keywords would return something.
    • you could bury them, and they slowly sped up with power on, and at death, the speedup motor became a generator.. I remember pricing one out at the time for work, to keep us juiced for a day would cost 20k + installation...
    • Moving parts - ugh. Maintenance, regular lubrication, yuck.

      There's a reason people use lead-acid storage batteries, they've proven to be a solid performer at a low price for years.

      This guy's company not paying for proper upkeep and disposal sounds so typical -- someone said they "needed a UPS" but didn't engineer the solution or document it and replacement of batteries was never budgeted-for.

      "Bad job" to whomever did that. Better to let the company suffer through a few outages and then present the prop

  • Retrofit to external batteries (Score:5, Informative)

    by Tau Zero ( 75868 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @09:13PM (#8527543) Journal
    I don't know what you're paying for new batteries (presumably the same gray rectangular things with the tab connectors which are so common in other hardware such as emergency exit lamps), but you may be able to get cheaper.

    Trolling/deep cycle batteries are available retail for rather reasonable sums. Some of them are sealed, but some are not; a non-sealed battery allows you to check it for water level and state of charge (via the specific gravity of the electrolyte). Plus, they usually offer several times the AH rating of the little gray things (good if outages may be extended). The UPS will feed quite nicely from most any 12-volt DC source.

    If you decide to hook up something like this, you'll have three issues:

    1. Cabling and connectors will have to be anti-chafed, fused, and otherwise protected in ways that the monolithic UPS box takes care of for you. Did I mention that you get to build this?
    2. The battery chemistry is similar but the actual charging requirements may differ; you are going to have to watch the battery state of charge yourself. (On the plus side, if the batteries are external to the UPSs you can just rotate batteries out every so often.)
    3. Most significant: a UPS modified to use external batteries is no longer UL certified, and may not be legal to use in your situation.

    It's up for you to research and present to your boss for a decision. I have a little UPS which had dead batteries and the honkin' hunka lead that I hooked up in their place carried me nicely through last August's blackout, but your results may differ.
    • Do NOT use non-sealed batteries in an indoor UPS setting, good way to kill yourself. Hydrogen Sulfide gas which is given off as the batteries are charged is REALLY nasty stuff.
    • Forklift batteries have extraordinary lifetimes. They're also expensive. Absorbed Glass Mat (AGM) batteries are a good compromise on life-cycle cost.

      The oversimplified rules of getting good battery life are
      o Don't deep-cycle anything but a deep-cycle battery
      o Don't overcharge them
      o Don't leave them undercharged for any length of time.

      The safety rules are non-negotiable:
      o Don't charge a non-sealed battery indoors
      o Fuse the leads AT the battery terminals
      o Don't leave exposed terminals where a tool or piece
    • I tried this. I bought a trolling battery to replace the little battery in my APC 650 (something or other).

      [yah, I'll head the warnings, move it out side and fuse at the terminal.]

      I think I need to recalcbrate my APC unit though. There appears to be about 4 adjustments. One that I already made was to set the output voltage and frequency. They were way off with the new battery, which has me confused, because as far as I could tell, the voltage was the similar to the old battery (just over 12V). Does +

  • Battery Issue Solved (Score:3, Funny)

    by beholder77 ( 89716 ) <dungeons AT gmail DOT com> on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @09:30PM (#8527683) Homepage
    Find a secluded field in the middle of nowhere, and bring a shovel... maybe a few friends.

    Either way, if anyone catches you claim you were digging up bodies for some sort of ritual, you'll do less time that way. :)

  • Yet another problem waiting to happen... (Score:5, Informative)

    by stienman ( 51024 ) <adavis&ubasics,com> on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @09:43PM (#8527793) Homepage Journal
    The reason you are having these troubles is not only is your boss uninformed, but, apparently, so are you. Let me give you some information which will help you understand the problems you are having.

    Lead acid batteries, as a general rule, only provide 50% of their capacity before destroying themselves trying to meet your needs. UPS's are emergency power sources ONLY. If you are using them to power stuff through power outages lasting more than a minute or two more than once or twice a year, then you are not using them correctly. If you use them until you drain the battery past 50% then the batteries are going to DIE horrible creeping death.

    Furthermore, if you overburden a UPS and it doesn't shut down because you're pulling too much amperage you may end up boiling the battery, which does not only reduce its life significantly, but "Vents With Flame" (to put it mildly).

    In your situation, UPSs can ONLY be used to keep the power on long enough to power off the servers/workstations (ie, less than a minute, maybe two) or until an external generator kicks in.

    Again let me reiterate.

    UPSs are NOT "Powers out. Hope it comes on before the UPS runs out."

    UPSs are instead "OH @#$%! THE POWER'S GONE! [SHUT EVERYTHING DOWN | START THE GENERATOR]!!!"

    Therefore if your boss does not understand the necessity of a generator, then you must convince him to purchase UPSs that are rated to last at least twice as long as you could possibly leave the computers on after the power goes out. Ideally you'll also get UPSs which are rated at twice the current you might be pulling so you don't heat up the battery while you are shutting down (a power hungry operation for most servers: shutting down)

    Lastly, concerning waste. Most battery centers accept and recycle old lead acid batteries for free. Check out batteriesplus.com for locations near you of a company I use and trust. Buy your replacements from them and they'll gladly recycle your old ones. Even if you don't purchase from them they generally accept them anyway.

    Do a cost/performance analysis on a generator. Tell them that batteries last twice as long (or longer) if you use them properly and get a generator. Show them that it's probably cheaper to get appropiately sized UPS unit(s) and a generator than it is to buy a bunch of small UPSs and no generator. Also demonstrate how it will benefit your customers, and how this should be sold to them.

    So. Accept this wisdom, and go forth and spread the word. Good luck.

    -Adam

    • Re:Yet another problem waiting to happen... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by D.A. Zollinger ( 549301 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @11:01PM (#8528330) Homepage Journal
      That is a really good point, and I would also suggest layering your power backup infrastructure. Many of the costs associated with providing acceptable power to the building we purchased was figured into the cost of building maintainance. We layered the power with an external generator (gets tested once a month - enough diesel stored on site for 72 hours of operation), a building-wide UPS (room dedicated to lead acid batteries), and a rackmounted UPS in every rack in our server room.

      The building-wide UPS powers a special outlet in every cubicle that everyone's computer is plugged into. If the power goes out, the lights may go out while the external generator gets up to speed, but the computers stay on (although we do have some employees who like to move things around - we find out who they are at the next power outage).

      The advantages of this are that the UPS doesn't get used very often, and when it does, it is only for a short period. However, if there are major power problems, we can stay up for a relatively long period of time.
    • To amplify, even at 50% cycle depth you're shortening the life of the battery. Shallow cycles are much better tolerated. You may get hundreds or thousands of cycles from 100% charge to 90% and back, but only dozens to 50% and back.

      I'm also not sure how much to trust the charging circuity in UPSes. If you really want maximum life from a battery, for example, the charger should adjust the float voltage depending on the temperature of the battery.
    • I've been there, lived in an apartment with a friend of mine. There were terrible power troubles there, and we had a stack of UPS'es...unfortunately even the stack wasn't enough for the load we were running. The power flickered one night, and we heard a terrible sound behind us, and then a crack-pop...one of the UPS'es literally exploded in flames and sparks shooting through the side vents. Luckly the plug was easily accessable. TO this day I shudder to think what might have happened had we not been hom
      • I had a similar situation with a microwave. I was reheating some macaroni and cheese, when it was ready I opened the microwave... the first hint this was not going to be a good day was, a plume of steam rose from the microwave as I opened the door. I got a towel and took the food out, grabbed a fork, and started to stir the macaroni and cheese. It needed stiring -- the water in it was BOILING, "Odd" I thought. It was about that time I became aware of a grumbling, humming sound. Like a vacum, I looked a

  • What we're doing... (Score:5, Informative)

    by OneFix ( 18661 ) on Wednesday March 10, 2004 @11:04PM (#8528373)
    We are going to install a backup generator that runs off of natural gas. Here's a link [americasgenerators.com] to one...

    We are of course going with a different company and generator, but it gives you an idea of price and features. $3500 might be too much for your situation. Keep in mind that you will still want to keep your UPSs in place (for the ~1-3 minutes that these things take to get up to speed)...

    But, if you must have power to all of your systems, all of the time, a natural gas generator is probably the way to go. Before you do any of this, you will want to check out how much power you are actually using and how big of a generator you will need...the one linked to should be enough for the 9 servers you need as well as room to upgrade...

    As you can tell, most of the natural gas generators also take propane, which is still good if you don't get natural gas service, or as a backup for the natural gas...

    • Are you planning on having Natural gas tanks on-site? What if whatever knocks out the power (landslide, hurricane, earthquake, etc) also knocks out the local gas service?

      • Not likely...anyhow, that's when you use the propane option. Just back up a trailer and you can flip the switch...keep in mind that these things need to have routine maintenence performed on them after 7 days of operation anyhow. To be honest, it's just not as likely. Sure, something COULD knock out the gas lines, but it's not likely...at least not here. like I said, just use propane...

        Around here (North-Eastern US), gas lines are burried at least 6 feet below ground. If something happened that was ba
      • For most of us, we only have to deal with one utility failure at a time. The only time I can remember our natural gas being unavailable is when they shut it off to replace a line.

        But... the generator in the link can run on natural gas or propane. With propane giving a higher output. Other than zoning regulations, propane is easily obtained. I'm planning to get something similar when I build my new house. Since I'm using heat pump(s), I won't have natural gas service.

        BTW, Generac is a good brand. Don
  • I remember reading some articles about fuel cell installations at sites that are off-grid or have unreliable power. It might be worth looking into.

  • battery maintenance (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    At some point, a rack of well maintained lead-acid batteries is going to become more economical than throwing out sealed units every two years. For info on battery maintenance, see http://www.usbr.gov/power/data/fist/fist3_6/3_6_co nt.htm
  • There've already been some good suggestions made that fit into this category - generators, natural gas/propane, and so on. But maybe it's time to set up a cage full of a BIG number of lead-acids, get a commercial-grade inverter that'll spit out nice clean electricity, and the necessary bits to handle inputs from the grid, a generator, photovoltaic panels, wind turbines, or anything else you can get there.

    With my little 1000VA APC toy, I'm already at the point where my powerhungry G5 can be the only thin

  • One important thing to keep ups batteries with a nice long life is good enviromental control. Regulated Humidity, and tempature helps ensure that you battery lasts longer. We have a 35KVA APC unit... APC came out and checked the unit, and after three years, they said our batteries are quite good, but they expect us to have to replace them in 6-18 months. Neat Huh?!?

    At my last job, we had four 500KVA units... Yes.. 500 KVA... They were powerware units... They were in fairly good condion except for the ba
  • GE has some microgen fuel cells which convert gas to electricity. So you'd have two different electrical power sources (but it won't save you if there's an earthquake or something that breaks the gas pipe and the powerlines, or someone disconnects a power cord...).

    Then there are high-tech flywheels.

  • Other options... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by grimace1969 ( 739534 )
    Why not pay for hosting and let someone else worry about the power problem? The reason co-location companies exist is so if you are in the range of businesses that can't afford heavy infrastructure costs, but have a definite uptime need then you can pool resources.

    You could also think about VPN, if you have 4 locations, is the power situation better elsewhere or are the 4 locations in the same general area? if they are spread out, maybe think about moving your servers to the area with the better power, a
  • What are good choices for UPS for Stereo/TiVo/TV setups?

    • What are good choices for UPS for Stereo/TiVo/TV setups?

      Generally speaking, a UPS doesn't make a lot of sense for that kind of situation. If the power goes out briefly, your stereo isn't at risk for data loss. Even a TiVo, despite being just a specialised computer with hard drives and everything, isn't going to benefit much from a keeping the power on, because that's the standard way to turn them off anyway: pull the plug. And a TV is probably going to suck a UPS dry in pretty short order.

      The main t

  • Don't bother buying low-end crap. Buy Telecom-grade UPSs. They will cost a little more but will last a lot longer. You also need to seriously think about 1) centralizing your server farms into one and then 2) putting the entire server farm on a generator. You servers will run off of batteries 24/7. Your city power will be used to charge that bank of batteries. When the city power craps out you're generator either needs to be on auto-standby (with a weekly test) or needs to be started by the on-call pe
    • At the college I work at, we have a backup generator that powers some of the lighting and other essential equipment. The engine is an older model Ford 6 cylinder that has a natural gas carburetor on it. The engine is cooled with cold tap water running through an exchanger.
      It always made me wonder what would happen to that engine if the power went out AND the municipal water supply lost pressure...
  • I read a slashdot post where someone suggested connecting sealed car/marine batteries to UPS's as opposed to lead acid batteries. My limited electrical knowledge says all the voltages are correct but it still makes me nervous to try :) I have a couple UPS's with no batteries to try this out with, but I have a hangup about burning my house down. Any suggestions?
    • I'm in the same boat. I've got a couple of old UPSes that the batteries are shot in. I talked with some folks about attaching much larger batteries to the unit. No problem right? Just take a bit longer to charge?

      Nuh uh.

      I disremember all the mechanics of it, but essentially, the integrated charger in the UPS will be unable to supply enough oomph (voltage? amperage?) to the batteries when charging and will burn itself out trying. Usually a literal burn-out with all the attendant flames and smoke. :(

      N

      • That's not true. A lead acid battery (whether sealed or not)
        ideally has almost zero impedance, and unlike NiCd and NiMh,
        it's charge level is measured by the voltage across the terminals,
        not the charge current delta.

        So connecting bigger cells (of the same voltage) works fine,
        and will simply yield longer run-time (and longer charge time).

        Here's a picture of my 105Ah 24v, deep-cycle battery setup for a
        standard APC 1400 UPS.

        This UPS even has a handy battery disconnect plug on the
        back, which can be used to co

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