Finding New Ways To Cool Data Centers Is Big Tech's Newest Arms Race
Finding New Ways To Cool Data Centers Is Big Tech's Newest Arms Race
BY TYLER DURDEN FRIDAY, JUN 18, 2021 - 04:15 AM
Still, as Bloomberg concedes, all those emails, memes, videos, PDFs and photos need to be stored somewhere. And with most companies increasingly reliant on cloud providers like AWS and Microsoft Azure, these companies are building data centers like crazy just to keep up with the demand. Right now, data centers consume between 2% and 4% of the world's electricity. However, engineers are scrambling to suppress costs as much as possible by finding new and innovative ways to cool the processors in their data centers (since cooling often accounts for half, or more, of a data center's energy usage).
The race to find new cooling strategies has apparently become so competitive, that a handful of startups have decided to take on Microsoft and Amazon as everybody races to develop increasingly effective solutions.
As the CEO of one of these startups told BBG: David Craig can’t
do much about the congestion, but he says he’s got a fix for the heat: A liquid
that bathes the cores of processors to keep things at a relatively chilly 50
degrees Celsius (122 Fahrenheit). "As we process much more
data, the chips are becoming three, four, five times hotter," says
Craig, chief executive officer of Iceotope Technologies
At this point processors are becoming so efficient that pretty
soon even the most efficient air conditioners available right now won't be able
to keep up with them, making America's tech infrastructure vulnerable to
outages.
While some heat is good for computers, too much can cause
systems to crash, and with each generation of computer chips running faster and
hotter, the systems will soon be too hot for even the most efficient air
conditioner. Finding better ways to keep temperatures down could save the
industry some $10 billion a year on electricity alone, according to Uptime.
“Air just isn’t a very effective medium for transferring heat,” says Rabih Bashroush,
global head of IT advisory services at Uptime.
Decades ago, companies kept most of their data on-site
downloaded on the hard drives of their computers. But those days - when a
simple breeze from an open window was enough to adequately cool computers - are
long gone.
Solutions focused on using non-reactive liquids to cool the
processors appear to be in vogue now as the next hot new thing. Both Microsoft
and Isotope, the startup whose CEO we quoted above, are heavily investing in
the new technology.
The market for equipment used to cool computer gear hit $10.5
billion in 2019 and is growing 13% a year, according to Allied Market Research,
sparking a race among companies ranging from startups such as Iceotope to the
likes of Facebook, Google, and Microsoft. Newer strategies focus mostly on
liquid technologies, including circulating specially formulated fluids through
tubes, submerging processors in the stuff, and even building data centers under
the sea. Market researcher PitchBook reports that venture capital
investment in data-center-cooling startups more than doubled last year, to $34
million. “Liquid cooling can provide more service in less space,” says
Arman Shehabi, a research scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
who studies power consumption in computers.
Microsoft Corp., which runs more than 200 data centers globally,
is testing systems in which servers are bathed directly in a fluid that doesn’t
conduct electricity. It estimates liquid cooling could allow it to fit 10 times
as much computing power in the same space. “We’re just starting down the liquid
path,” says Christian Belady, chief of the unit that develops technology for
data centers. “You’re going to see a lot of rapid change in how we do things.”
At least a dozen smaller startups have joined the fray. Spain’s
Submer Technologies SL sells sealed pods that are filled with servers bathed in
a nonconducting liquid and can be plugged directly into a network. The
company says the excess heat can be used to warm nearby buildings, and the
technology extends the life of the computer because no dust reaches the
processor. Netherlands-based Incooling BV uses a fluid that gets boiled into a
gas by the processors before being cooled back into a liquid and recirculated, which
the company argues is the most efficient way to absorb heat. “We’re
able to maximize the potential of every component,” says
co-founder Helena Samodurova.
The startups haven't had much trouble raising capital so far,
making this a rare business where Microsoft can't simply buy its way out of the
competition.
Iceotope, based in Sheffield, a three-hour drive north of
London, has raised more than $10 million from venture capital backers since its
founding in 2005. It initially sought to manufacture its own cooling systems,
but about five years ago it shifted to developing the underlying technology. Iceotope
is raising another round of funding from strategic investors that it expects
will give it better entrée to more customers, and last year it opened an office
in the U.S., aiming to expand its business there. Although the company had less
than £10 million ($14 million) in 2020 sales, Craig says
he aims to at least double revenue this year as partnerships with computer
manufacturer Lenovo Group Ltd. and some smaller companies start to bear fruit.
“The market is getting hot, fast—no pun intended,” he says. “If we don’t deal
with cooling efficiently, we’ll be in real trouble.”
Like the old saying goes: To the victor goes the spoils.
https://www.zerohedge.com/technology/finding-new-ways-cool-data-centers-big-techs-newest-arms-race
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