A data storage system and associated method is provided within an enclosure supporting a self-contained plurality of discrete data storage devices configured for connecting with a network device via a network. The data storage system includes a redundant array of independent drives (RAID) container services module in the enclosure that allocates and manages a storage space of the data storage devices for storing primary and redundant data, and a policy engine in the enclosure that continuously and qualitatively characterizes the network load to the data storage system and manages a power distribution to each of the data storage devices based on a predicted utilization that differentiates between access commands for primary data and access commands for redundant data.