In recent years system and data center consolidation has been a hot topic In the federal government. But how does a government agency actually embark on such a complex journey? Since everyone’s systems and long term IT needs are different, it has been difficult to recommend one unified approach to trimming system complexity and redundancy.

Finally, there is a process in place for federal agencies. The Office of Management and Budget, along with the Federal CIO Council and Federal Chief Information Officer Vivek Kundra, has outlined some very specific steps that agencies should follow in order to plan for long-term changes to the way they use, manage and grow both large and small data centers.

Per a recent edict from Kundra al major U.S. Federal agencies are developing action plans which will outline how they intend to assess and eventually consolidate their data centers. The need is substantial because, as the CIO points out in a memo to Agency CIOs, the number of federal data centers has grown from 492 in 1998 to over 1,100 in 2009. there is too much space, too many redundant systems and too much power consumption.

Richard Spires, from the Homeland Security Department and Mike Duffy from the Department of Treasury will lead the data center consolidation efforts within the CIO Council.

The goal is to eventually reduce overall federal IT spending while also boosting energy efficiency. Kundra who joined the Obama administration in March of 2009, initially outlined his goal of overhauling and consolidating the federal IT infrastructure last August.

The Approved Process

The Office of management and Budget (OMB) is asking agencies to survey their data centers by this summer

Phase 1 – IT Asset Inventory Baseline (Including Preliminary Assessment & Quick Wins)

Assessment will include details such as facility location, how the data center is utilized, and by whom, whether a facility is stand-alone or co-located with other activities, square footage of the facility, legal ownership details, measurement of energy consumption, and ongoing costs. those who conduct the assesment will be required to:

• Create an inventory of HW.SW assets by data center
• Capture baseline metrics for utilization & energy for each data center
• Identify quick wins, including specific deliverables
• provide an IT Asset inventory for the baseline and the quick wins.

Deadline: Baseline inventory due by March 10, 2010

Phase 2 – Application Mapping

Efforts must be made to extend the ongoing inventory to the level where administrators can map applications:

• To servers
• To specific databases and platforms
• To specific application dependencies
• With specific details on application security
• With details on application usage and service level agreements (SLAs)
• with information on segment architecture

Deadline: Not specifically called out, but this phase will immediately follow Phase 1, and must be completed before the June 30 deadline for the initial data center consolidation plan.

Phase 3 – Analysis & Strategic Decisions

- Perform energy and cost evaluation for possible different approaches

- Identify the risks, alternatives, cost assumptions and business benefits

- Make strategic technology & consolidation investment decisions

Specific deliverables: consolidation analysis and strategic investment decisions on standard platforms and services

Deadline: Initial Data Center consolidation Plan due by June 30, 2010.

Phase 4 – Consolidation Design & Transition Plan

- Design and test consolidation alternative

- Develop transition plan for energy use optimization and data center consolidation

- Create a project plan and full Work Breakdown Structure for the transition plan

Specific deliverables: Consolidation design and transition plan

Deadlines: Final consolidation plan must be prepared by August 30, 2010. OMB to approve plans by December 31, 2010

Phase 5 – Consolidation & Optimization Execution

- Execute virtualization, consolidation and migration plans

- Execute energy use optimization plans

measure and report on utilization and cost saving metrics

Specific deliverables: Consolidation and execution plus progress reports

Deadline: Will vary per agency, but should be as outlined in their consolidation plan

Phase 6 – Ongoing Optimization Support

- Based on lessons learned from previous work, continue energy use optimization and consolidation

Specific deliverables: Ongoing semiannual metrics reports

- Continue ongoing monitoring and reporting of utilization and cost saving metrics.

Deadlines: Update the asset inventory annually by the end of the third quarter of each fiscal yearstarting in FY2011; Report progress on executing data center consolidation plans by the end of each fiscal year quarter starting in FY 11; and Reflect changes in asset inventories and account for execution of data center consolidation plans in subsequent years' budgets.

"These plans must be approved by OMB by Dec. 31," the memo states. "The final plans will include a technical roadmap and approach for achieving the targets for infrastructure utilization, energy efficiency and cost efficiency."

One likely end-goal if the extensive assessments is to slow the expansion of government data centers by instead focusing on enterprise architectures that will support more cloud-based IT services