Cooling of Data Centers Using Airside Economizers

The power trend for Server systems continues to grow thereby making thermal management of Data centers a very challenging task. Although various configurations exist, the raised floor plenum with Computer Room Air Conditioners (CRACs) providing cold air is a popular operating strategy. These rising heat load trends in data center facilities have raised concerns over energy usage. The environmental protection agency has reported that the energy used in 2006 by data center industry was 1.5% of the total energy usage by entire nation. The experts agree that by year 2010, this usage will approach 2% of the annual energy use nationwide. This has been the driving force behind the new solutions or technologies such as free cooling. Recent studies show that the outside air can be drawn in to cool the IT equipment without any undue electronic component failure due to contaminant. In this paper, different cases employing air side economizer are discussed. Numerical models are created to study the qualitative impact of the solution under various operating conditions.