Cross-Connect Blog

Thought Leaders Discuss the State of the Data Center Industry and Its Future

November 08, 2016

Energy Efficiency Solutions

Chatsworth Products (CPI) recently participated in Data Center Frontier's Data Center Executive Roundtable, which asked five thought leaders, "What do you see as the important trends driving how data center operators are approaching cooling?" Below are highlights from the conversation.

"Today we are in the middle of the third generation of data center cooling – environmental. Our goal is to minimize the environmental impact of the high-capacity, high-efficiency cooling systems deployed in generations one and two. This is the generation of economization. The idea is to use outside air when possible to keep the data center floor cool." - James Leach, Vice President of Marketing at RagingWire Data Centers


"Economization, whether direct or indirect, allows operators to realize tremendous savings in operational cost, with little or no extra risk to the system. That’s good for the environment, and for the bottom line, which makes it possible to deploy more servers, or be profitable in a competitive market." - David Shepard, General Manager of the BASELAYER

 

"I believe advancements in semiconductor technologies coupled with adoption of GPUs (graphics processing units), the industry will continue to create more headroom for existing cooling methods, whereas maybe five years ago many predicted liquid cooling would become a pervasive technology." - Ted Behrens, CPI's Executive Vice President of Global Engineering, Product Management & Marketing

"Now we are seeing 10 to 25 kW per rack or greater becoming more common. I think those are the trends that will continue and are driving how people are approaching data center design and cooling. These trends are driving a higher volume of cooling to the delivery aisles, containment, alternative cooling sources and methods." - Robert McClary, Chief Operating Officer for FORTRUST

"... hyperscale data center operators and a select group of others are moving to evaporative cooling – either direct or indirect — to use outside air to reduce cooling costs. This has the potential to consume a large amount of water, which is a growing problem in some areas. " - Jack Pouchet, Vice President Market Development at Emerson Network Power

At CPI, we continue to help data centers address the challenges discussed in this forum. Find out how CPI Passive Cooling® Solutions provide innovative airflow management techniques that allow you to maximize your cooling efficiencies without the need for additional CRAC units, in-row air conditioners or liquid cooling solutions. From small applications with heat loads of 2 kW per cabinet, to large data center applications with heat densities beyond 30 kW, CPI Passive Cooling Solutions provide advanced thermal management with zero points of failure, thus providing no impediments to Tier IV availability. Kim Ream, Marketing Project Manager

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