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Datacenters
Fans and control technology for ventilation and air conditioning in data centers.
The IT sector is one of the world's most rapidly growing industries, with no end to this growth in sight. With smart ventilation and control technology from ZIEHL-ABEGG, you can equip your data center to meet the IT industry-wide specifications of the future: high-performance, secure, needs-oriented, and optimally energy-efficient even at maximum performance.
It's also important to keep power consumption and energy costs in data centers as low as possible. The energy consumption of IT is a matter of concern not only within the industry itself, but also for climate researchers, politicians, and consumers. The growing awareness of the importance of energy efficiency worldwide is making itself felt, among other ways, in stricter directives and requirements that manufacturers and users alike must follow. Options for operating data centers more sustainably include recapturing waste heat generated from operations, for example, using heat pumps, and reusing it in various ways.
Every data center needs sufficient ventilation and air conditioning in order to operate reliably and without faults. In large data centers, ventilation and cooling for IT devices, and air conditioning for the rooms which house them, are essential. The servers, processors, memory systems, and other devices that convert electrical into thermal energy as they operate at data centers and telecommunications stations must not be allowed to overheat at any point. After all, the damage, failures, or data loss that could result are among the worst things that can happen in the IT industry. This means that all of the components that assist in the ventilation and air conditioning of data centers must, first and foremost, be completely reliable and failure-proof. With fans from ZIEHL-ABEGG in combination with coordinated monitoring and control technology, you can rest assured that the consistent, pre-defined climate (temperature and air humidity) indispensable for keeping your data center operating efficiently and reliably is being maintained at all times.
When it comes to cooling and ventilating data centers large and small, operators can save a great deal of energy by putting their trust in energy-efficient air conditioners, fans, and control technology. This can be achieved either with comprehensive and smart planning prior to start-up, or with conversions and retrofitting for an existing data center. Here, comparatively small steps can have an enormous effect, drastically reducing the data center's power consumption. For example, exchanging unregulated fans for more energy efficient models with power-saving EC technology or implementing better networking, monitoring, and control of your ventilation system can make a considerable difference. Naturally, this also has a significant effect on operating costs: From day one you can save so much money that your investment in better cooling, ventilation, and control rapidly pays for itself, before going on to bring you gains on every front in the longer term.
Telecommunications centers and their server rooms operate constantly, with no breaks or holidays. Telecommunications services - data processing, transmission, and forwarding -
are requested and needed around the clock, and must therefore be reliably available day and night. The same is true for air conditioners and fans: Sought-after characteristics include outstanding failure safety, precise controllability, a long service-life, and easy maintenance, in order to prevent faults and failures of the cooling and ventilation systems and the overheating of IT devices .
When it comes to ambient air conditioners for cooling server units in telecommunications centers, there are two popular concepts:
- Computer Room Air Conditioners (CRAC) operate in a similar way to air conditioning systems with a mechanical (air) cooling system. The air is then cooled using a refrigerant and then fed back to the racks through a double floor .
- Computer Room Air Handlers (CRAH) remove the heat from server rooms using a ventilation unit and fans. The air conditioner is often located outdoors, whether on the roof or on the side of the data center. The supply air is cooled using chillers and transported back into the server room.
In order to prevent the mixing of warm and cold air flows, thereby air conditioning rooms and devices more energy-efficiently, reliably, and evenly, various enduringly popular hot-aisle/cold-aisle concepts have been developed, which divide the IT center into a number of different climate zones. The fans, which often transport hot or cold air on a continuous basis, must be particularly resistant to extreme temperatures and also be equipped with good corrosion protection.
Free cooling or economization is one of the newest and most energy-saving cooling concepts for telecommunications centers and systems. In it, cooling is achieved using external air. For it to work, the air must be cold enough to achieve the required cooling effect without additional cooling using air conditioners. In colder climate zones, or during winter, free cooling can save significant amounts of energy and consumption costs.
In large telecommunications and data centers, numerous other technologies are employed alongside CRAH and CRAC . Row cooling systems, which are installed on the backs of racks, operate more energy efficiently because the cooling is closer to the heat source, which also reduces the risk of unwanted air circulation patterns . "Fan walls", which consist of many fans arranged together in a frame structure, also offer this advantage and are very flexibly deployable and expandable.
In modern telecommunications centers, various cooling systems such as CRAC, CRAH, or row cooling are often combined together in order to reduce energy consumption, thereby making the system more efficient and also more environmentally friendly. The energy efficiency of the fans can be massively increased with more economic drive technology (e.g. EC instead of AC) and modern, smart monitoring and control technology . Precise speed regulation of the fans integrated into the rows also enables temperature and energy consumption to be far better measured and controlled.
Room climate devices:
- Room-cooling system units installed on the ceiling
- Large room climate device units installed at the edge of the room
- In-row cooling: closely-linked air conditioners
Rack air distribution:
- Air distribution systems for power density racks and low pressure areas
- Fan walls for free cooling and ventilation of axial and centrifugal fans
Coolers and heat removal:
- Liquid coolers – air-cooled water chillers, dry coolers, and capacitors with axial fans
- Evaporative cooling units with axial and centrifugal fans
- Free cooling/chiller units with axial fans
- Cooling towers with axial and centrifugal fans
Devices like these are not only used to air condition and cool data centers, but also in various constellations and designs for residential buildings, production facilities, clean rooms, and much more. A vital factor for long-term fault-free, efficient, and also economic operation in all cases is perfect coordination and control: All devices and components must be optimally suited to the relevant requirements, in addition to being ideally compatible with each other.
Fans and fan systems
Our ZAvblue and ZApilot centrifugal fan systems are perfect for rack and in-row cooling systems. The fans fit virtually anywhere, are quick and easy to install, and contribute an immediate efficiency increase of up to 10% in comparison with conventional market standards.
FE2owlet and FE3owlet axial fans from ZIEHL-ABEGG stand out with an innovative blade geometry for exceptional efficiency coupled with astonishingly quiet operation. The profile of their blades is inspired by the wings of the barn owl. They're also perfect for local rack and in-row cooling of switch and computer cabinets.
Modern air conditioners and ventilation systems should cool data centres and computer rooms with the greatest air flow possible and minimal pressure loss. With fans from the ZAbluefin, Cpro, and ZAvblue series, you can significantly increase air flow and system efficiency at excellent acoustic values and without increasing fan size.
In order to transfer operating heat from data centers to the outside air, coolers, chillers, or cooling towers are often used. Large axial fans must demonstrate high performance in continuous use, operating as energy-efficiently, quietly, and with as little maintenance as possible. With our FE2owlet, FE3owler, and ZAplus- and ZAplus+ fans you have an integrated axial fan system with optimized full nozzle, motor suspension, and diffusor, as well as exceptionally good corrosion protection, that impresses with high air handling capacity and energy efficiency with low noise generation.
With systems like the GR module, ZAplus, and other pluggable IO and add-on modules, ZIEHL-ABEGG makes it easier for you to design, assemble, and install ventilation systems. And with smart monitoring and control technology developed by us in-house, you can rest assured you have the best solution for easy networking and reliably monitoring each and every fan at any time in accordance with the current requirements and needs of your data center.
We assist you with planning, selection, and configuration
ZIEHL-ABEGG is also in the Royal League when it comes to service After all, we want you to feel completely satisfied with your cooling, ventilation, and air conditioning system, and in good hands from the planning and product selection phases onward.
In addition to personal consultation, which we are also happy to provide on-site, we offer you a user-friendly selection software for ZIEHL-ABEGG fans in the form of FANselect. Using this you can quickly and conveniently identify the suitable centrifugal or axial fan to deploy in machines and systems for data centers of any type or size. The world's first selection tool for fans, based on measurement data from our InVent technology center - the most precise measurement data in ventilation technology - combined with a specially developed algorithm. FANselect is TÜV certified and can be accessed for use at www.fanselect.net.
* These ZIEHL-ABEGG products, which are suggested as possible solutions for these applications, are purely informative and serve as a rough guide. Consequently, individual contact with our technical sales experts is necessary and advisable with regard to a specific application so that the individual use can be checked and approved with regard to the explicit conditions.