If you live in Melbourne as we do, you would know that winter is here, and it is COLD!
Typical temperatures during a winter’s day don’t exceed 13-16 degrees celsius, which begs the question: Why are many data centres spending a fortune on ‘cooling’ to 19-25 degrees, when the ambient outside air is already colder than their data centres need to be?
Most data centres use chilled water and refrigerant based air conditioning systems that aren’t exactly friendly to our precious environment. So, to us it doesn’t make sense to put so much effort into mechanically ‘cooling’ a data centre inside when there is so much cooling available outside.
But, a change is in the wind… literally! Why not take this infinite supply of cool fresh air from outside and bring it inside the data centre? This saves in power costs, but more importantly reduces our greenhouse gases by up to 90%!
Many new data centres are going down the same road. Data Centres in cooler climates are even being built without chillers! There are many ways to do this, but ultimately the goal is to bring the cool air inside without the need of mechanically cooling it.
We have chosen a revolutionary new air conditioning system which does just that. It eliminates the need for refrigerants by using 100% fresh, filtered, outside air. A single unit alone has the same cooling capacity of a 17 kw air conditioner but uses only a maximum of 600 watts of power during the hot weather when it is cooling the warmer air that has been brought in from outside.
Assuming both were running at full capacity, this would save 160,000 kg of carbon emissions per years, on just one unit.
Coupled with our 25,000 litre rainwater collection system, we feel our choice for cooling is a very environmentally responsible one.
