Development and Testing of a Control strategy for dynamic cooling at Rack level in Data centers

Author

Amrutha Valli Rachakonda

Graduation Semester and Year

2019

Language

English

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering

Department

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

First Advisor

Dereje Agonafer

Abstract

Cooling is a critical part of data center’s infrastructure, and with ongoing demands in data processing and storage, thermal management issues are of great concern. Some imperative methods of removing heat are either using air or liquid (preferably water or refrigerant). When high power density modules are involved, liquid cooling addresses some of the problems faced by air cooling as liquid coolants have higher thermal capacitance. Also, in the case of multi-chip modules, a non-uniform heating due to multi-core generates hot-spots and increases temperature gradients across the module. A dynamic cold plate along with a self-regulated flow control device was developed to address these issues. A temperature sensing self-regulated flow control device (FCD) is placed at the exit of each section to regulate the required flow. But to implement this at rack level, a good control strategy is required. This study presents a CFD analysis of such control strategy to save Pumping power on a direct liquid cooled rack using a concept of dynamic cooling along with a self-regulated flow control device. It’s important to save pumping power as it is one of the most energy consumed areas in the data center. The main objective of this study is to assess the flow rate and pressure distribution on the rack in order to control excessive pumping power usage and enhance cooling system efficiency.

Keywords

Direct liquid cooling, Dynamic Cold plates, Flow control device, Energy efficiency, Control strategy, Pumping power savings.

Disciplines

Aerospace Engineering | Engineering | Mechanical Engineering

License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License.

Comments

Degree granted by The University of Texas at Arlington

Recommended Citation

Rachakonda, Amrutha Valli, "Development and Testing of a Control strategy for dynamic cooling at Rack level in Data centers" (2019). Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Theses. 702.
https://mavmatrix.uta.edu/mechaerospace_theses/702