Just imagine the amount of energy that will be required to run those facilities. Data centers worldwide today are already consuming 1-2 percent of overall power and according to Goldman Sachs Research, AI is going to push data center power demands by 160% by 2030.
PUE 101: Measuring How Data Centers Use Energy
PUE is a widely used metric in the industry that helps measure how data centers are using their energy. This metric is a ratio between the total energy amount a facility consumes and the energy specifically used by the IT equipment. The closer the PUE is to 1, the more efficient the data center is. For example, the ideal PUE of 1.0 implies that every unit of power consumed is utilized solely by the IT equipment. The problem is that data centers are not even close to this PUE. In fact, the industry as a whole has been pretty much stuck at around 1.5, which means that 50 percent of data center power is being used for cooling, lighting, and other systems. That means that if an AI factory is pumping in 10 megawatts, only 5 megawatts is going to compute and 5 megawatts is going to what is cooling that compute.
This number is only going to get more important with the transition to 100 megawatt AI factories, which is why countries such as those in Europe are starting to institute new regulation requiring data centers to measure and report their PUEs in an effort to reduce their environmental impact. As reported by Data Centers Dynamics, all European data centers larger than 500kW will soon be required to report factors such as floor area, installed power, data volumes, energy consumption, PUE, temperature set points, waste heat utilization, water usage, and use of renewable energy. This information will then be used to “provide a basis for transparent and evidence-based planning and decision making by member states and the Commission" and “assess certain key elements of a sustainable data center."
Similar regulation is also happening in places such as Singapore where the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) recently established new criteria that data centers have to meet to ensure the use of sustainable energy and more efficient cooling methods. As part of this new ruling, data centers will be required to maintain a PUE of at least 1.3
ZutaCore Paving the Way to 1.1 PUE and Below!
While regulation may get us to 1.3 or even 1.2 PUE, ZutaCore aims to get the industry to 1.1 and below with its two-phase, direct-to-chip liquid cooling technology. It’s HyperCool technology has already been proven to cool the hottest chips of 2,800 watts at a PUE as low as 1.05 – 1.07 increasing compute density. This delivers 10-20% better energy efficiency with dynamic cooling, smaller pumps, and no performance degradation over time. The heat transfer fluid doesn’t need to be replaced and poses none of the risks that water presents in terms of leakage or corrosion. The system allows for higher server densification needed in AI factories, consuming up to 50% less space than air-cooled datacenter and up to 75% less space than immersion cooling.
Highlighting its ability to lead the charge in better PUE, ZutaCore recently published a white paper on the Open Compute Project (OCP) website that outlined two sample configurations of “all-in-one” prefabricated data center in a container using ZutaCore’s HyperCool technology. These use cases combined facility structure, IT equipment, power infrastructure, and cooling into one shippable enclosed unit, providing a plug & play computing solution.
The Power of PUE!
Bringing PUE down can have a substantial impact on a data center ROI as well as global sustainability. For example, if a company or government mandates 1.2 PUE, they can take back 30 megawatts of power from a 100 megawatt data center. And in the configuration examples from ZutaCore above, getting to 1.06 would mean that only 6 percent of the power is going to cooling. This is significantly less than a current 1.5 PUE data centers that have 50 percent of their power being used for cooling.
If you’re ready to transform your data center to effectively meet the growing demands for more power but maintain sustainability goals, download our eBook to learn how HyperCool® can help you.