As power densities continue to increase in today’s data centers, heat removal is becoming a greater concern for the IT professional. Unfortunately, air conditioning terminology routinely used in the cooling industry is unnecessarily complicated, making it frustrating for IT professionals to discuss current cooling requirements.

Complex jargon used to describe cooling systems is easily explained in layman’s terms of heat, humidity, temperature, pressure, and flow. Cooling-related units of measurement are also a source of confusion for IT personnel when assessing cooling needs.  IT managers can understand and specify cooling requirements without knowing these complex HVAC terms. 

The HVAC industry uses complicated and highly redundant terminology.  Apart from the terms related to mainframe-driven cooling methodologies, there is an influx of new terms related to the server and rack enclosure architectures common in today’s IT environment. This unnecessarily complex terminology makes it difficult for IT managers to effectively communicate requirements to cooling professionals, which may lead to suboptimal cooling solutions. 

Schneider Electric’s new White Paper 11 ‘Explanation of Cooling and Air Conditioning Terminology  for  IT Professionals,’ carefully lists the complex terminology coupled with concise and helpful definitions. This paper provides essential reading for the IT professional to get to grips with the ever complex terminology of the cooling and air conditioning industry.