Why the biggest risk to your data center is in your head

It’s a false sense of security that humans are incredibly good at developing that leads to battery failures. "No news is good news" doesn’t apply to battery monitoring given when it comes to UPS battery failures, 80% are due to undetected battery problems.

Such problems are costly, both in time and money. It’s with that in mind that we’ve put together a new white paper to demonstrate why you need something watching when you're not.

The false assurance that no change means no risk when it comes to battery monitoring is a practical guide about why battery monitoring systems are not just ‘set and forget’. It’s not enough to implement a battery management system (BMS) and relax.

Why, when the role of batteries is so critical, isn’t there more attention paid to their health and well-being? In some cases, overwhelmed operational managers simply have too much to think about already, so they ignore alerts and reports on battery health. An alarm will sound, and their first response is “how do I turn that alarm off?”

Yet others lack sufficient knowledge about their batteries and the environment in which they’re kept. Many data center managers have an extensive IT background, but a battery is essentially an electrochemical device. They make the mistake of seeing a battery as an inert object, instead of an active one, meaning batteries must be regularly monitored and actively managed.

And many become lulled into a false sense of security that if they're not seeing any changes, there's nothing wrong.

The white paper looks at these key areas:

• Why some of the biggest problems around battery failure result more from psychology than technology
  
  
• Why a BMS needs to be regularly checked – setting up and walking away is asking for trouble
  
  
• Why you can’t manage what you can’t measure – monitoring a battery means you need to have the ability to gauge its state of health at any given moment
  
  
• Common undetected problems – the consequences of failing to keep regular monitoring of battery activity
  
  
• Why it’s essential to develop a monitoring plan from the outset

UPS battery failure is the biggest risk to your data center operation, but it is human nature to downplay the significance of future risks. Even more so when batteries can be out of sight and out of mind.

Download the white paper here