---------------------- Forwarded by Phillip K Allen/HOU/ECT on 09/06/2000
10:49 AM ---------------------------
Jeff Richter
09/06/2000 07:39 AM
To: Phillip K Allen/HOU/ECT@ECT
cc:
Subject: Wow
---------------------- Forwarded by Jeff Richter/HOU/ECT on 09/06/2000 09:45
AM ---------------------------
To: Mike Swerzbin/HOU/ECT@ECT, Robert Badeer/HOU/ECT@ECT, Sean
Crandall/PDX/ECT@ECT, Tim Belden/HOU/ECT@ECT, Jeff Richter/HOU/ECT@ECT, John
M Forney/HOU/ECT@ECT, Matt Motley/PDX/ECT@ECT, Tom Alonso/PDX/ECT@ECT, Mark
Fischer/PDX/ECT@ECT
cc:
Subject: Wow
---------------------- Forwarded by Tim Belden/HOU/ECT on 09/06/2000 07:27 AM
---------------------------
Enron Capital & Trade Resources Corp.
From: Kevin M Presto 09/05/2000 01:59 PM
To: Tim Belden/HOU/ECT@ECT
cc: Rogers Herndon/HOU/ECT@ect, John Zufferli/HOU/ECT@ECT, Lloyd
Will/HOU/ECT@ECT, Doug Gilbert-Smith/Corp/Enron@ENRON, Mike
Swerzbin/HOU/ECT@ECT
Subject: Wow
Do not underestimate the effects of the Internet economy on load growth. I
have been preaching the tremendous growth described below for the last year.
The utility infrastructure simply cannot handle these loads at the
distribution level and ultimatley distributed generation will be required for
power quality reasons.
The City of Austin, TX has experienced 300+ MW of load growth this year due
to server farms and technology companies. There is a 100 MW server farm
trying to hook up to HL&P as we speak and they cannot deliver for 12 months
due to distribution infrastructure issues. Obviously, Seattle, Porltand,
Boise, Denver, San Fran and San Jose in your markets are in for a rude
awakening in the next 2-3 years.
---------------------- Forwarded by Kevin M Presto/HOU/ECT on 09/05/2000
03:41 PM ---------------------------
Enron North America Corp.
From: John D Suarez 09/05/2000 01:45 PM
To: Kevin M Presto/HOU/ECT@ECT, Mark Dana Davis/HOU/ECT@ECT, Paul J
Broderick/HOU/ECT@ECT, Jeffrey Miller/NA/Enron@Enron
cc:
Subject:
---------------------- Forwarded by John D Suarez/HOU/ECT on 09/05/2000 01:46
PM ---------------------------
George Hopley
09/05/2000 11:41 AM
To: John D Suarez/HOU/ECT@ECT, Suresh Vasan/Enron Communications@ENRON
COMMUNICATIONS@ENRON
cc:
Subject:
Internet Data Gain Is a Major Power Drain on
Local Utilities
( September 05, 2000 )
In 1997, a little-known Silicon Valley company called Exodus
Communications opened a 15,000-square-foot data center in
Tukwila.
The mission was to handle the Internet traffic and
computer servers for the
region's growing number of dot-coms.
Fast-forward to summer 2000. Exodus is now wrapping up
construction
on a new 13-acre, 576,000-square-foot data center less than
a mile from its
original facility. Sitting at the confluence of several
fiber optic backbones, the
Exodus plant will consume enough power for a small town and
eventually
house Internet servers for firms such as Avenue A,
Microsoft and Onvia.com.
Exodus is not the only company building massive data
centers near Seattle.
More than a dozen companies -- with names like AboveNet,
Globix and
HostPro -- are looking for facilities here that will house
the networking
equipment of the Internet economy.
It is a big business that could have an effect on
everything from your
monthly electric bill to the ease with which you access
your favorite Web sites.
Data centers, also known as co-location facilities and
server farms, are
sprouting at such a furious pace in Tukwila and the Kent
Valley that some
have expressed concern over whether Seattle City Light and
Puget Sound
Energy can handle the power necessary to run these 24-hour,
high-security
facilities.
"We are talking to about half a dozen customers that
are requesting 445
megawatts of power in a little area near Southcenter Mall,"
said Karl
Karzmar, manager of revenue requirements for Puget Sound
Energy. "That is
the equivalent of six oil refineries."
A relatively new phenomenon in the utility business,
the rise of the Internet
data center has some utility veterans scratching their
heads.
Puget Sound Energy last week asked the Washington
Utilities and
Transportation Commission to accept a tariff on the new
data centers. The
tariff is designed to protect the company's existing
residential and business
customers from footing the bill for the new base stations
necessary to support
the projects. Those base stations could cost as much as $20
million each,
Karzmar said.
Not to be left behind, Seattle City Light plans to
bring up the data center
issue on Thursday at the Seattle City Council meeting.
For the utilities that provide power to homes,
businesses and schools in the
region, this is a new and complex issue.
On one hand, the data centers -- with their amazing
appetite for power --
represent potentially lucrative business customers. The
facilities run 24 hours a
day, seven days a week, and therefore could become a
constant revenue
stream. On the other hand, they require so much energy that
they could
potentially flood the utilities with exorbitant capital
expenditures.
Who will pay for those expenditures and what it will
mean for power rates
in the area is still open to debate.
"These facilities are what we call extremely dense
loads," said Bob Royer,
director of communications and public affairs at Seattle
City Light.
"The entire University of Washington, from stadium
lights at the football
game to the Medical School, averages 31 megawatts per day.
We have data
center projects in front of us that are asking for 30, 40
and 50 megawatts."
With more than 1.5 million square feet, the Intergate
complex in Tukwila is
one of the biggest data centers. Sabey Corp. re-purchased
the 1.35 million
square-foot Intergate East facility last September from
Boeing Space &
Defense. In less than 12 months, the developer has leased
92 percent of the
six-building complex to seven different co-location
companies.
"It is probably the largest data center park in the
country," boasts Laurent
Poole, chief operating officer at Sabey. Exodus, ICG
Communications,
NetStream Communications, Pac West Telecomm and Zama
Networks all
lease space in the office park.
After building Exodus' first Tukwila facility in 1997,
Sabey has become an
expert in the arena and now has facilities either under
management or
development in Los Angeles, Spokane and Denver. Poole
claims his firm is
one of the top four builders of Internet data centers in
the country.
As more people access the Internet and conduct
bandwidth-heavy tasks
such as listening to online music, Poole said the need for
co-location space in
Seattle continues to escalate.
But it is not just Seattle. The need for data center
space is growing at a
rapid clip at many technology hubs throughout the country,
causing similar
concerns among utilities in places such as Texas and
California.
Exodus, one of the largest providers of co-location
space, plans to nearly
double the amount of space it has by the end of the year.
While companies
such as Amazon.com run their own server farms, many
high-tech companies
have decided to outsource the operations to companies such
as Exodus that
may be better prepared for dealing with Internet traffic
management.
"We have 2 million square feet of space under
construction and we plan to
double our size in the next nine months , yet there is more
demand right now
than data center space," said Steve Porter, an account
executive at Exodus in
Seattle.
The booming market for co-location space has left some
in the local utility
industry perplexed.
"It accelerates in a quantum way what you have to do
to serve the growth,"
said Seattle City Light's Royer. "The utility industry is
almost stunned by this, in
a way."