Driven by AI, cloud computing, and electrification, data centers are growing in size and power demand. Conventional centralized electrical distribution systems are challenged to meet their reliability requirements.

With its single point of failure, a conventional centralized system puts data centers at risk of widespread outages that cost time, money, and customer trust.

Utility-style distributed systems, on the other hand, feature multi-switchgear lineups that limit the impact of faults and reduce the risk that a single equipment issue disrupts service across the system. As data centers continue to scale, those same design principles become increasingly important.

No more single points of failure. No more unnecessary downtime.

Get to know the differentiators Vista switchgear offers compared to conventional circuit breaker-based systems, including advanced protection, control, and relays that reduce fault risk.

Unlike a conventional circuit breaker lineup, Vista switchgear combines advanced switches, fault interrupters, and relays for protection and control, helping isolate a fault fast while keeping unaffected circuits connected.

Ever-increasing demand has data centers looking for simple expansion opportunities without sacrificing reliability—or profit.

Data centers that rely on centralized, breaker-based electrical distribution systems face difficult choices when expanding: Either add more load to the existing system at the risk of overtaxing it or invest in an additional onsite centralized system to support the added load.

As campuses grow, the risks of centralized architecture increase with them. Distributed electrical systems are designed to scale while maintaining operational continuity.

Using a distributed system with S&C switchgear, data centers can expand existing electrical systems into newly built structures by simply adding more switchgear units.

As visualized here, each switchgear unit distributes power to a set number of server racks. When the data center expands its physical footprint and adds more racks, the distributed electrical system expands as needed, adding switchgear units to accommodate the extra racks and higher loads.

Since distributed systems are capable of fault isolation and power rerouting no matter the size, the data center’s expanded system maintains its reliability, empowering the data center to scale up without sacrificing uptime.