Reducing the physical size of servers does not lead to lower power requirements for data center cooling systems. Quite the contrary: the widespread transition to the compact high-performance servers, including blade ones, which containe a lot of processor cores, resulting in considerable increase of power consumption per a separate cabinet and pre data centers as a whole. The equipment density growth greatly complicates the tasks of cooling equipment manufacturers and data center designers.  

Today, a standard 42U server cabinet could dissipate 24 kW and more, and what is more, power consumption of the largest Ukrainian data centers reaches a several megawatts. And the vast majority of energy-intensive data centers are located in cities with a population of one million or more, often - in the central part thereof. Where to get the megawatts in a city center from? How to dissipate it?

There is a data center energy recycling becomes the more and more widespread abroad. Recently, Academica, the Finnish company, announced the construction of large data center in a cave. The use of cave cold air for data center cooling will considerably reduce the operation costs. Moreover, thermal energy produced by the installed equipment will be sent to municipal heating system.

Is it too futuristic and far from the Ukrainian realities? Maybe, you are right, but by the data center designers estimates, the customer during a year will save about 561 thousand dollars at utility bill payments. So, the data center energy recycling is not only the formal support of "green" technologies, but also a considerable savings? 

The most progressive way to minimize the data centers cooling costs is to use the cold outdoor air. There are the water or glycol chillers with a "freecooling" feature to realize this idea.  They containe the special heat-exchange unit, where the coolant, heated by indoor air conditioners, is chilled by cold outside air. In the climatic conditions of Ukraine, such systems could be used the most of the year, excepting the hot summer period, allowing to refuse from the compressor cooling of refrigerant. According to "FLEX-Integration" experts,  the Emerson 1 MW chillers with "freecooling" feature at least twice pay for themselves during the lifecycle, which reaches not less then 15 years.