Case Studies - Air Cooling the Data Centre

EcoCooling have recently completed a project for Cambridge University Mechanical Engineering Department to cool their data centre. The project was to consolidate a number of small server rooms into one data centre for the department
The Department had two requirements: - A low energy requirement reflected in a low PUE for financial reasons and the need to reduce the power consumed to enable expansion.
The project which was managed by consultants K J Tate was to refit the data centre and implement cold isle containment using evaporative cooling.

The existing system was a conventional DX refrigeration system which was operating at a PUE of 1.6. Measurements taken by the department showed the DX system was operating at a COP (coefficient of performance) of 2 meaning that it was taking the equivalent of 50% of the cooling load to cool the servers.

The new scheme comprising of 6 ECP CRECS (computer room evaporative coolers) has a design capacity of 150kW. The units are situated on the 4th floor of the department.  A plant room was created to house the units with a Louvre allowing fresh air into the plant room.  The CRECS discharge attemperated air directly into the cold isle.   Hot air from the servers is ducted through the plant room via an attemperation loop and is then discharged outside through roof vents.
On implementation the IT load has increased from 70- 100kW and the cooling energy use is now approximately 5% of the IT load. The Department is now running at a PUE of less than 1.1 with the EcoCooling CREC system operating at a COP of 20 giving a net reduction in energy use of 90%.

The system is controlled with an EcoCooling bespoke control system which is linked directly to the existing Trend building management system.

David Green Facilities Manager at the Department commented - “the EcoCooling CREC system works better than we expected – it does exactly what it says on the box, we are delighted with the system and would definitely recommend it.”