System and method for the application of psychrometric charts to data centers

1. A method for displaying temperature and humidity sensor data provided by a plurality of sensors distributed within a data center at a user interface, comprising the steps of:

a) receiving a data set from each of the plurality of sensors comprising temperature data and location data for the sensor;

b) identifying one or more sensor data sets including relative humidity data for the sensor,

c) calculating absolute humidity data for the one or more sensor data sets as a function of the temperature data and the relative humidity data;

d) identifying at least one sensor data set having no relative humidity data;

e) identifying another one of the plurality of sensors as a nearest sensor having absolute humidity data as a function of the location data,

d) inserting a copy of the absolute humidity data from the nearest sensor in the data set of the one sensor having no relative humidity data;

e) plotting each of said data sets as a data point on a psychrometric chart; and

f) transmitting image data for said psychrometric chart to the user interface.

2. The method of claim 1 , comprising the additional steps of:

g) determining that one of the data points is outside an environmental envelope; and

h) visually highlighting the one data point.

3. The method of claim 2 , comprising the step of customizing an environmental envelope by a user at the user interface for display on the psychrometric chart.

4. The method of claim 1 , comprising the additional step of selecting an environmental envelope by a user at the user interface for display on the psychrometric chart.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the location data identifies an equipment rack position.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the equipment rack position identifies one or more of a row number, a rack number or a sensor height within the rack.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the location data identifies a position of the sensor in x-y-z coordinate space.

8. A monitoring system for monitoring temperature and humidity sensor data provided by a plurality of sensors distributed within a data center at a user interface, the monitoring system comprising:

a computer connected to a first and second network, and

a stored program executed on said computer and causing said computer to perform the steps of:

a) receiving a plurality of sensor data sets from the first network each comprising temperature data and location data for a sensor,

b) identifying one or more sensor data sets including relative humidity data,

c) calculating absolute humidity data for the one or more sensor data sets as a function of the temperature data and the relative humidity data,

d) identifying at least one sensor data set having no relative humidity data;

e) identifying another one of the plurality of sensors as a nearest sensor having absolute humidity data as a function of the location data,

d) inserting a copy of the absolute humidity data from the nearest sensor in the data set of the one sensor having no relative humidity data;

e) plotting each of said plurality of sensor data sets on a psychrometric chart, and

f) transmitting image data the psychrometric chart over the second network to the user interface.

9. The monitoring system of claim 8 , wherein the stored program is further executed on said computer to cause said computer to prepare an environmental envelope for display on the psychrometric chart.

10. The system of claim 9 , wherein the environmental envelope may be defined by the operator to conform to an ASHRAE standard.

11. The system of claim 9 , wherein the environmental envelope may be customized by the operator as distinct from an ASHRAE standard.

12. The system of claim 8 , wherein the first and second networks comprise a single network.

13. The system of claim 8 , wherein one or more of said sensor data sets further include sensor identification data.