MCI WorldCom's telecommunications switch facility on the second floor of the 40-story Prudential Building, however, needs year-round environmental control. Housing millions of dollars of computers and telecommunications equipment, the facility generates an extensive amount of heat and requires a steady level of humidity, and must be free of airborne contaminants.
The 18,200-sq-ft facility provides local and national long-distance telephone and data service to thousands of businesses inside 40 square blocks of downtown Chicago, including the famed Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT). In fact, the computers at the company's facility handle more than 1 million transactions daily from the CBOT. The CBOT's early hours and frenzied trading creates a large and fluctuating demand for information processing.