European Commission Recognizes ZutaCore as a Key Innovator in HEATWISE's Hybrid-Cooled Micro Data Centre Demonstrator at EMPA pilot

 The HEATWISE–EMPA pilot has been officially recognized by the European Commission's Innovation Radar, with its hybrid-cooled edge data centre prototype listed as an EU-recognized innovation. The recognition names ZutaCore as a key innovator alongside EMPA Swiss federal labratories for Material Science and Technology and RISE Research Institutes of Sweden, highlighting the collaborative effort behind the project.  

The recognition comes at a time when growing digital infrastructure demands are increasing pressure on both energy efficiency and sustainability. As computing workloads continue to expand, new approaches to cooling, waste heat recovery, and energy management are becoming increasingly important.

HEATWISE was established to explore how waste heat generated by IT infrastructure can be captured, managed, and integrated into building energy systems. The project combines ZutaCore’s advanced cooling technology, intelligent energy management, digital modelling, and heat recovery strategies to improve energy efficiency and support more sustainable operation of buildings with significant IT loads.

What is HEATWISE?

HEATWISE (Holistic Energy Management And Thermal Waste Integrated System for Energy Optimisation) is a Horizon Europe research and innovation project that addresses thermal management and energy optimization in buildings with significant IT infrastructure. The project brings together research institutions, technology providers, and industry partners to develop and validate solutions that connect IT systems, cooling technologies, and building energy management. Demonstrations are being carried out across several European pilot sites, validating how advanced cooling, waste heat recovery, and intelligent energy management can improve the efficiency of buildings with significant IT loads.

ZutaCore's Contribution to HEATWISE

As part of the project, ZutaCore contributed its waterless two-phase direct-to-chip liquid cooling technology.

Unlike conventional cooling methods that rely primarily on sensible heat transfer, two-phase cooling removes heat through a liquid-to-vapor phase change directly at the processor. This process enables significantly more efficient heat transfer while requiring substantially lower coolant flow than traditional liquid cooling approaches.

The technology is particularly well suited to modern AI workloads, where processor power continues to increase and cooling systems must manage higher heat densities without consuming excessive facility resources.

Within the HEATWISE project, ZutaCore's technology contributes to the project's hybrid cooling architecture. By enabling efficient heat capture at higher temperatures, the technology supports one of HEATWISE's central objectives: producing directly usable waste heat that can be integrated into building energy systems and reused rather than rejected to the environment.

Demonstrating the Benefits of Hybrid Cooling

Research conducted through the HEATWISE project demonstrated the practical advantages of combining two-phase direct-to-chip cooling with traditional air cooling.

Testing showed that when using CPU only servers the facility water supplied for heat reuse could be maintained at more than 50°C at any load conditions. These elevated water temperatures enabled direct heat reuse, eliminating the need for a heat pump in many applications. The hybrid architecture also enabled the liquid cooling loop to capture up to 70% of the server heat load at elevated inlet temperatures, while using air immersion configuration to capture nearly 100% of the servers' heat output.

The results demonstrate how advanced cooling technologies can extend the thermal capabilities of existing infrastructure while supporting more efficient operation and improved heat recovery.

From Cooling Waste Heat to Reusing Energy

One of the most important outcomes of HEATWISE is its focus on heat reuse.

Traditionally, IT systems generate significant amounts of waste heat that are often rejected to the environment. HEATWISE explores how this thermal energy can instead be captured and reused within building energy systems, improving overall energy efficiency and reducing environmental impact.

This creates an opportunity to improve overall energy utilization while reducing the environmental impact of digital infrastructure.

As governments, operators, and enterprises place greater emphasis on sustainability, heat reuse is becoming an increasingly important component of future data center design.

Advancing Sustainable Energy Management for IT-Intensive Buildings

AI, edge computing, and high-performance workloads are accelerating the need for more efficient cooling technologies.

HEATWISE demonstrates how two-phase liquid cooling can help address the industry's growing thermal and power challenges by improving cooling efficiency, reducing infrastructure overhead, supporting heat reuse, and enabling more effective use of available power.

The European Commission's Innovation Radar recognition validates the importance of this work and highlights the role advanced cooling technologies will play in the future of edge data centers.

ZutaCore is proud to contribute to HEATWISE alongside all the consortium partners helping develop technologies that support more sustainable, high-performance digital infrastructure.

HEATWISE is co-funded by the European Commission and the Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI).

Authors: 

Lilach Butchmits - HEATWISE Project Manager, ZutaCore

Shahar Belkin - Chief Evangelist, ZutaCore