The Information Management Journal

August 2007

SELLING THE SIZZLE — PREPARING FOR POWER FAILURE

If your organization totally lost power right now for 75 minutes, what function would be most critically impacted? Would it be your web site where customers place or track orders? Or conduct business with their checking and credit card accounts, if you are a bank? Would it be the password-guarded link that lets your financial officers make daily reports to regulatory authorities? Would it be your e-mail system that reaches employees in several states with information from your office?

It is likely that your Business Continuity Plan (BCP) assumes there’s a higher possibility of a power failure occurring than any other natural or manmade disaster.

And that if another form of disaster occurs—fire, flood, tornado, earthquake, civil unrest—loss of power will probably be part of it. Knowing this, you have identified your organization’s vital records and have copies of them safely stored at a site some distance from your building. You are encrypting daily transactions and sending them electronically to an e-vault far away.

Your BCP team identified key businesses process areas (customer service, loss of income, loss of customers, loss of needed-daily information, fulfilling regulatory obligations). Looking at each area, your team members assessed how many hours or days would elapse before there was a strongly negative impact on each area.  It could hit customer service in a few hours. It could be a few days before the possibility of legal liability crept in.

Assessing the need for speedy recovery and the money available to make this happen, your company may, fortunately, have established a mirrored recovery site with duplicate communications that can be switched to instantly with no break in operations.

Stepped-down degrees of such hot site facilities can be available in one or two hours, or in six to 12 hours. A pre-arranged cold site can be operational in two to three days.

However, there are ways to prevent power failures and they are part of the BCP, too.

Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) systems are designed to prevent power fluctuations or failures that disrupt computer operations. One company, APC, offers UPS battery pack power in sizes ranging from single PCs to networks and servers, data centers, industrial uses, and customized installations. Developing a UPS system requires a great deal of homework to determine the electrical loads for circuits not only in the IT facility but also all circuits for the building that it is in. The electrician who services the building should be part of the process. This information should become part of the BCP because it will determine the capacity that is needed for an offsite recovery facility as well.

The rule of thumb is that a UPS system should be at least 25% larger than the present critical load to accommodate future needs. And since a UPS system is not 100% efficient, another 10% should be built into its capacity.  The UPS system must be able to provide battery power equal to the total critical load. The length of time it can do this is determined by its number of batteries and the type of batteries. Usually batteries and their maintenance are purchased through a separate contract. The room in which batteries are installed will need outside ventilation and air-conditioning as well. Also check the size of input power cables, and your local utility should check the input size of its transformer.  For more information on UPS systems, go to www.drj.com.

If the power is out everywhere for a long time, you’ll need a generator.

Many large facilities, or those whose weather patterns cause outages frequently, have come to rely on generators to insure continuous power. Some have permanent generators. Others will rent one from a local contractor or disaster recovery company, but usually there must be a written contract in place to insure that a generator is available when they are in great demand.

A mechanism for assuring that a generator is installed or can be obtained when needed belongs in the BCP. In making these arrangements, some questions arise concerning a generator’s capacity. Does it have the output to cover all critical functions? Can it run for a long time without failing? Are there unseen factors that could affect its performance?

About 10 years ago there was a power failure that covered a large area of northern United States and Canada. It last nearly four weeks. Some of the lessons learned about generators from that trying time have been recounted in an article titled “Surviving Extended Power Outages” by David Goodrich (www.drj.com/articles/sum98/goo.html.

Because North America seldom has power outages, facilities which owned generators had not used them frequently and had not tested nor maintained them. When the big need came, they could not perform.

Some generators only ran for a short time. Many generators are built for intermittent duty of a few hours at a time and then they need to be serviced. Before installing a generator, find out the duty cycle and do not run it for more than the maximum time between service intervals. To truly insure continuity of power, use two generators which normally operate one at a time but which can both be on line and running before one is shut down for service.

Generators require fuel, usually diesel oil or natural gas. Natural gas lines may be disrupted by an earthquake or a flood. Most sites may have only three days worth of diesel oil on site. Can the fuel supplier get to your site, and does he have enough oil to fill the generator’s tank  initially and to refill it a few days later?

Bringing in a portable generator and getting it installed is no simple matter. Cables will have to be run from the generator to the main power switchgear which may mean they have to go through doorways or up stairs over long distances. Far better is to have in place the wiring that will connect the main power switchgear to an outdoor junction box next to the area where the generator will sit. Again, this takes thinking ahead as part of the BCP.

Power from a generator may vary in quality, and voltage and frequency variations may be severe enough to cause shut-downs. The type of voltage regulator and governor and the load will affect the quality of power.

When back-up power arrangements include UPS systems and generators, it is important that these be tested and maintained regularly,  with the results and name of the person doing the work being recorded in the BCP.

Here’s some back-up reading for the back-up plan.

APC which makes UPS systems has produced a series of white papers that can be downloaded for free at www.aps.com . These are based on surveys of management personnel including corporate CIOs, facility managers and IT managers. White Paper #4 is titled “Essential Power System Requirements for Next Generation Data Centers.” White Paper #12 is titled “Essential NCPI [Network-Critical Physical Infrastructure] Service Requirements for Next Generation Data Centers.” These have relevance because they can help the reader identify power functions and problems that can impact a BCP and a company’s ability to recover quickly.

Your storage contractor will have his or her own plan for disaster recovery and business continuity and could share some ideas that may be helpful to you.

ARMA International’s 2007 Conference and Expo

Proper management of your records and information is a critical element to the success of any organization-and in today’s marketplace better business demands better records and information management. The best place for organizations to learn and prepare to manage information better is ARMA International’s 52nd Annual Conference and Expo in Baltimore, Maryland October 7-10.

Information is becoming more and more important to business as the amount of it continues to grow rapidly. Along with this increase comes an increase in regulations, litigation costs in e-discovery, threats to privacy and the challenge of making sure every employee has the correct training.  

Conference

ARMA International, a not-for-profit professional association announces its 52nd Annual Conference and Expo. Attendees from the fields of records management, information technology (IT), legal, health care, government, business, are invited to take advantage of this premier educational event that will take their careers and organizations to the next level in information management.

ARMA International Annual Conference and Expo
October 7-10, 2007
Baltimore Convention Center
Baltimore, MD
Registration: Members $799 (before August 25)
Non-members $1,049 (before August 25)
Register online at www.arma.org/conference

 

The conference features more than 80 educational programs presented by experts in the legal, IT and records and information professions. These visionaries will cover topics such as how to make best practice part of your organization and will provide solutions, tools, and ideas for the issues facing businesses today.  

The conference will feature Congressman Michael Oxley of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) and Annette Simmons author and president of Group Process Consulting, as the featured keynote speakers. 

Additionally pre-conference seminars are being offered October 5-6 in response to business groups finding themselves in a changing world of records and information management. Topics include: 

                        Records and Information Management: The Fundamentals

                        Ethics Application in the Legal Environment 

                        Collaboration for the New, Information-Centric Enterprise

                        Computer Skills for Records Managers: The Missing Link

                        Electronic Records Management 

                        Records Emergencies and Disasters Happen: Prepare to Survive  

ARMA 2007 Conference registration for non-members includes a 1-year association membership. Registration details for both the conference and the pre-conferences can be found at www.arma.org/conference.  

Expo

Along with educational sessions, ARMA International’s Annual Conference and Expo will be showcasing more than 200 companies featuring cutting-edgy technology and products. The expo is held in conjunction with the conference and is open to the public without charge. To learn more and to pre-register online visit www.arma.org/expo.  Registration to the FREE expo also includes the Executively IT Sessions, October 8-9, which will feature several technology-focused panel discussions led by leading vendors in the industry. Additionally the expo features an Industry Intelligence Pavilion, Vertical Marketing Sessions and a Government Solutions Showcase. Sessions are open on a first-come first-serve basis. 

About ARMA International

ARMA International (www.arma.org) is a not-for-profit professional association and the authority on managing records and information. Formed in 1955, ARMA International is the oldest and largest association for the records and information management profession with a current international membership of more than 10,000. It provides education, publications, and information on the efficient maintenance, retrieval, and preservation of vital information created in public and private organizations in all sectors of the economy. It also publishes the award-winning Information Management Journal.

Benchmark Your RIM Program 

RIM programs have long played a vital role in the success of many organizations through reducing risk and streamlining access to information. Today, that role is more important than ever as companies struggle with issues of compliance, privacy, discovery, and electronic formats. Best Practices LLC, a  recognized leader in benchmarking and best practice research, has created a new benchmarking service for RIM leaders to help assess program performance and resource levels on an ongoing basis. The new benchmarking exchange service will help identify and correct gaps in program performance or resource levels through a comparative gap analysis of individual data. Each participating organization will receive a customized report summarizing the results. ARMA International members are being offered this custom service at a substantial cost reduction. ARMA members receive a rate of $1,250 to $1,950 (based  on company size). The non-member rate is $3,975. This new service will provide RIM leaders with key, multi-industry operational metrics for several key areas.             

You can view the study at: www3.best-in-class.com/cw35.htm http://www3.best-in-class.com/cw35.htm For additional information, or to request a sample of the deliverable, please contact Jonathan Tanz, VP of Research, Best Practices, LLC, 919.767.9227, or jtanz@best-in-class.com.