Each data center hosts thousands of computers to dish out the music, videos, social media, and work content around which we have built our lives. These facilities often use huge fans to keep the IT hardware cool. Without sufficient cooling, the servers would fail. The problem is, all of this air cooling comes at a huge cost both to your bottom line and the environment.
How can big data centers become sustainable? Short answer: liquid immersion cooling! This fascinating new technology cools the data centers with liquid rather than air. You may think that it’s unsafe to cool computer hardware with liquid, but engineers at GRC have achieved a liquid immersion cooling system that’s both safe and high-functioning. Moreover, immersion cooling makes data centers more energy-efficient and profitable.
Why Are Data Centers Called ‘Energy Hogs”?
Data centers conduct an immense amount of processing. They calculate and distribute billions of pieces of information each day. Whether you’re streaming a silly cat video, sending an email, or collaborating with colleagues, you’re relying on data centers to perform the behind-the-scenes work.
Of course, all of that work requires energy. So, it’s not surprising that data centers end up being among the heavier energy users. That’s why data centers are considered “energy hogs.” They burn through unfathomable amounts of coal and other fossil fuels traditionally used to generate power.
The two main draws on electricity in data centers are the servers and cooling systems. That’s right! Believe it or not, cooling a data center can eat up as much electricity as running the servers themselves. Cooling systems can even chew through more power than storage drives, network devices, and other actual IT equipment.
Since data centers are among the worst offenders—using around 3% of global electricity and rising—it’s now necessary to look beyond inefficient air cooling. This outdated cooling approach just doesn’t cut it anymore. What’s required is a modern, energy-efficient technology like liquid immersion cooling.
Is Air Cooling Really Not Enough?
While air cooling has cooled data centers for years, it’s now facing challenges beyond its capabilities. Society is placing far more demand on servers than ever; requiring more and more energy. Air cooling literally cannot handle the heat as more powerful processors reach the market.
Air cooling starts to lose steam at around 15 kilowatts per rack and tops out at around 30 to 35 kilowatts. A modern server rack can reach around that level with the central processing units (CPUs) alone. With even more power-hungry accelerators becoming increasingly popular, a data center simply can’t rely on air cooling. Not to mention, computational density is also on the rise.
The fact is, air cooling isn’t enough. Instead, we need smarter cooling technology that can handle larger amounts of heat in the same rack volume. Here’s the good news: that technology exists in the form of liquid immersion cooling. Moreover, immersion cooling offers multiple other benefits including low total cost of ownership, high safety, and consistent performance—all while protecting the server equipment against corrosion and other risks.
Immersion Cooling is Great–But What About Sustainability?
Liquid immersion cooling is an amazing technology but is it sustainable? The answer is yes. In fact, not only is it sustainable, but immersion cooling also enhances sustainability! Immersion cooling draws less energy than traditional air cooling systems, so you get more cooling with fewer carbon emissions. In other words, you get more bang for your ecological buck!
In addition to reducing carbon emissions, immersion cooling also enables the reuse of waste server heat to further increase sustainability. During operations, the servers recycle the heat that traditional air cooling systems just blow out into the atmosphere. Blowing the heat out into the atmosphere worsens climate problems, whereas immersion cooling repurposes said heat to be used for invaluable processes like growing agricultural products or heating entire cities.
Environmentally sustainable liquid immersion cooling is also economically sustainable. You spend less on both electricity for the cooling and on replacement parts for overheated, corroded, and worn-out parts. As such, immersion decreases capital expenditures and operating expenditures.
As the innovator of liquid immersion cooling, GRC has written a report on data center sustainability. As sustainability becomes a key demand of customers and regulators, most data centers are working to clean up their act and immersion provides the perfect solution. Liquid immersion cooling cuts the use of power from dirty sources while allowing data centers to handle more output.
This white paper describes how dire the situation has become and how sustainability pressures now require liquid cooling. Immersion uses a much smaller percentage of electricity for cooling infrastructure compared to traditional techniques; leaving more resources for computation and the environment.
How Immersion Cooling Saves Energy
Intel, Google, Microsoft, and other heavy energy users and producers of servers see immersion as the future of cooling. It cuts carbon footprints by as much as 40% and uses a third less real estate thus, saving money while saving the environment. Immersion cooling uses a liquid that transports heat away over a thousand times better than air can, using less energy to achieve stronger cooling.
Technology companies are switching to liquid immersion cooling for their own data centers, and improving designs to make immersion even easier for more data centers to implement. Immersion cuts cooling energy costs by an unbelievable 95%! Immersion cooling uses far less energy than conventional cooling methods to eliminate heat from IT equipment. Plus, by eliminating the complex and power-hungry air cooling infrastructure, overall data center power usage is dramatically reduced as well. Less energy means better sustainability and more profits in your pockets.
The total energy and maintenance costs will decrease by half when you upgrade a data center from air cooling to immersion cooling. It’s the right call to make for your budget and to help maintain the planet we call home.
Looking for Immersion Cooling Solutions? Talk to GRC
GRC offers environmentally friendly immersion cooling for any application, even the most demanding high-performance computing. Now you can compute any amount of output with immersion cooling.
This cooling technology also works extraordinarily well for enterprise, cloud, and hyperscale data centers. Artificial intelligence, blockchain, and other loads are increasing power use; but you can still maintain minimal power use with the reliable aid of immersion cooling.
When you’re ready to experience the undeniable advantages of liquid immersion cooling, reach out to the experts at GRC. We innovated single-phase liquid immersion cooling, the most efficient solution on the market, and we can make it work for you and your business. Contact GRC today!
