Data Center Design CFD Modeling Shows Upsite Technologies Methodology Lowers PUE
Upsite Technologies' "4 R's" approach to airflow management shown to lower PUE and increase equipment reliability.
Upsite Technologies, Inc., (Upsite) has announced that computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling in data center design has demonstrated the energy savings outlined by its 4 R’s of Airflow Management™ methodology. The company tapped Future Facilities North America (Future Facilities NA), the premier provider of engineering simulation software for data center design and operational planning, to demonstrate the findings through the utilization of its 6SigmaDCX CFD simulation tool.
Upsite’s 4 R’s of Airflow Management provides a guide for implementing changes to optimize cooling and achieve the greatest benefits of airflow management, including a lower Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) score, reduced energy costs, and increased IT equipment reliability. The 4 R’s methodology details the improvements and best practices made to a data center’s racks, raised floor, rows, and room that will provide these benefits and optimize the cooling infrastructure. 6SigmaDCX was used to model a 4,000 sq ft data center and provide engineering simulation to assess the impact of the changes made to these four areas: rack, raised floor, row, and room. The simulation provided valuable information about how problem areas (e.g. hot spots) could be rectified and how capacity and operating cost benefits could be realized after making AFM improvements to each of the 4R’s. The execution of the steps resulted in: