FOCUS COOLING UPDATE
Issue 15, April/May
FOCUS UPDATE: COOLING
T
he first KyotoCooling installation was devised in Holland in 2006. Since then a number of deployments have been made around the world.
But despite large-scale interest by proponents of the technology, not everyone is convinced.
The Kyoto wheel, seen as an improved version of the original heat wheel used in industrial buildings, completely separates inside air from out (it picks up heat from the data center in half a rotation and releases it outside in the second half). But at 13ft to 20ft in diameter, its size has won over its critics. Those who speak against KyotoCooling also dismiss it for its reliance on natural temperatures, while others have said it could be seen as “overkill” as it works by cooling the entire data center instead of specifi c racks or aisles.
For KyotoCooling Australian director Tony Khoury, however, most opposition has come from a reluctance to try a product that has a limited footprint in the countries in which it is offered. But now one project is promising to get the ball rolling in Australia and possibly the Asia Pacifi c region, adding to examples that already cover Europe, the US and Canada.
“A lot of people have been eagerly interested in seeing the fi rst installation,” Khoury said. “The product is fairly well known but it has taken time and hard work to get this fi rst one into the market.”
PREPARING FOR TAKE OFF Without a large marketing
KyotoCooling has relied on budget, successful implementations to get the product known.
“Product sales have continued to grow on the back of successful implementations, with some well-known independent experts endorsing it,” Khoury said.
Melbourne Airport – an international
operation catering to 27 million passengers a year in an environment with weather known for its schizophrenic fl uctuations (boiling one minute, cold the next) – will be, you could say, KyotoCooling’s fi rst marketing vehicle for Australia.
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KYOTOCOOLING: CATCHING THE TAILWIND Big things are being expected by the KyotoCooling team, which is hoping a more global footprint will push its product out to other locations around the world fi nds Penny Jones
Bypass air dampers for low ambient air temp operation
Rotary heat exchanger for free-cooling operation
Outside ambient air
Inside air flow to and from the data centre
Internal DX system with multiple cooling stages for high ambient conditions – each cell can also be fitted with water based cooling coils
KyotoCooling works by separating the inside air from out
The KyotoCooling 300kw cell will come prefabricated as a rooftop unit for fi tting on the exterior of the airport’s new data center, with another deployment being planned for when the airport constructs its second data center, which is currently in design stages.
According to Melbourne Airport manager for information
systems Mark Funston,
the KyotoCooling system will provide free air cooling for between 80% and 90% of the year, “making it a powerful tool for cutting use and costs, while reducing carbon emissions”. “When outside temperatures rise in summer, cooling can be progressively switched to conventional cooling systems... with KyotoCooling contributing to cooling as temperatures drop in the night hours,” Funston says.
It comes prefabricated, with control systems already installed, meaning it is also quick and easy to fi t. The control systems are predesigned and optimized, which contribute greatly to a stable running platform.
The Melbourne Airport project has been in planning for nearly two years but the KyotoCooling contract was only signed in
COOLING AROUND THE WORLD Melbourne Airport is not the only customer KyotoCooling is working with in Australia. “We have at least three sizable projects we are discussing, but some have got the perception that the climate here is wrong,” Khoury said.
“People have this perception that cold is good but if the weather outside is too cold you need to warm it up before delivering it to IT equipment, and that can lead to its own set of problems in design. The future of data center cooling in places such as Australia has to be airside economizing, and with our humidity levels it just makes a lot of sense to use the indirect approach.”
According to Khoury, Australian customers and consultants have been very risk-averse – and rightly so. “The Australian business environment is one where the
consultant
takes on a lot of the risk. Those that spend the time to understand KyotoCooling realize this is a better way of using existing 40-year-old technology. This fi rst deployment will go a long way to proving the systems benefi ts.”
late 2010. “Implementation costs were put forward and KyotoCooling was not the cheapest or most expensive option, but it was the most effi cient. With obvious energy cost increases coming on, it made sense to go down this path and it offered high effi ciency without the risk of allowing the outside air directly into the data center,” Khoury said.
Today, KyotoCooling cells can be found on data centre fl oors, rooftops and building sides in different environmental settings around the world – a factor that is slowly but surely starting to speak for itself. n
See more articles on cooling at
www.datacenterdynamics.com /focus/themes/cooling
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