Castrol, a BP-owned lubricant brand, intends to build development and testing facilities for immersion cooling technology at its global headquarters in Pangbourne, Berkshire. in an attempt to reduce the amount of energy wasted in data center cooling.
The facilities will be used to explore strategies for capturing and recycling heat from data center operations in order to boost efficiency. Castrol also intends to expand its collaboration with Submer, an immersion cooling technology company.
Data centers are mostly the target for increased sustainability initiatives because they consume a lot of energy, The International Energy Agency estimates that data centers use up to 1.5% of the world’s electricity, and that since 2010, the rise in the demand for data centers during the past ten years has led to an increase in data center energy use of up to 30%; and nearly 40% of data centers’ energy utilization is used for their cooling.
Electronic waste heat can be eliminated by a process called liquid immersion cooling. Typically, it decreases the heat by totally emerging devices in a non-conductive liquid.
Since data centers can use up to 5 million gallons of water every day based on an NBC investigation, immersion cooling, according to Castrol, can also significantly lower water consumption.
Moreover, according to Submer, the process can eliminate water waste, cut cooling operational expenses by 95%, and reduce energy consumption in data centers by 50%. The company claims that their technology can catch and repurpose heat in data center facilities for other purposes.
The project’s objective is to hasten the development of immersion fluid technologies, particularly for technological infrastructure and data centers. Castril says, the initiative will aid in the creation of cutting-edge, more efficient and sustainable fluids for liquid cooling. Additionally, it will provide test and certification programs for companies needing sustainable data center operations.
“Immersion-cooled data centers could bring huge gains in performance and big reductions in energy wasted in cooling,” says Rebecca Yates, BP’s technology vice president of advanced mobility and industrial products.
