Which data center cooling technique is best for your business?

Data centers are the backbone of modern businesses, storing and processing vast amounts of data. However, this functionality comes at a cost: servers and IT equipment generate significant heat, which can in turn cause severe damage. With servers working harder to support high-density workloads, managing data center temperatures is becoming more important than ever.

To avoid damage and downtime, effective data center cooling is essential. Meanwhile, efficient cooling also helps to maintain operational efficiency, reduce energy costs, and minimize carbon emissions. In this guide, we explore modern data center refrigeration technologies, how to manage common cooling challenges, and the innovations shaping the future of data center energy efficiency.

What Is Data Center Cooling?

Data center cooling refers to the systems and strategies used to maintain the temperature of IT infrastructure within safe operating limits. Servers, storage devices, and networking hardware generate considerable heat during operation. Without proper cooling, this heat can lead to equipment failure, system downtime, and higher data center cooling costs.

Cooling systems work by transferring heat away from the hardware, either through air-based cooling or liquid-based solutions. This ensures continuous operation of critical systems and supports high performance.

Why is data center cooling important?

All mechanical equipment increase in temperature to some extent, with CPUs and GPUs generating extremely high levels of heat. Unfortunately, high temperatures and humidity can quickly cause severe damage to data center infrastructure, making cooling vital to the overall health of your enterprise IT systems.

However, the importance of data center cooling –and making the right choice for your company- goes beyond preventing hardware failure. Efficient cooling strategies directly impact businesses through:

• Continuous operation: Effective refrigeration minimizes downtime and hardware damage due to overheating, maximizing business productivity.
• Operational costs: Reducing power consumption through energy-efficient techniques lowers electricity bills.
• Carbon emissions: By using less energy, and therefore producing fewer CO₂ emissions, modern cooling techniques can contribute to sustainability goals.
• High performance: Servers run more reliably at optimal temperatures, boosting overall data center performance and operational efficiency.

Understanding how much heat a data center produces is vital for designing an effective cooling infrastructure. Large-scale data centers can generate enough heat to warm an entire office building, highlighting the need for advanced cooling methods.

What are the types of data center refrigeration?

Data center cooling technologies can be grouped into air-based, liquid-based, and evaporative-assisted systems. Some techniques enhance traditional air systems, while others replace conventional heat removal entirely with fluid-based thermal transfer.
The technique you choose will depend on factors such as your current infrastructure and your budget. Let’s break down the different cooling strategies businesses tend to use:

Cooling type	How it works	Power usage	Use case
Mechanical cooling	Uses chilled air circulated via CRAC/CRAH units	High	Low-density racks, legacy infrastructure
Free cooling	Uses outside air or water when conditions allow	Low–moderate	Cooler climates
Evaporative (adiabatic) cooling	Uses water evaporation to pre-cool incoming air	Low–moderate	Dry/hot climates with water access
Direct Evaporative Cooling (DEC)	Evaporates water through a saturated evaporative pad to cool incoming air	Low	Energy-efficient facilities with controlled humidity tolerance
Indirect Evaporative Cooling (IDEC)	Uses evaporation on a secondary stream to cool air without adding moisture	Low–moderate	Hyperscale data centers needing humidity stability
Liquid cooling (direct-to-chip)	Circulates deionized water or water–glycol coolant through cold plates to hot components	Low–moderate	High-density compute, AI workloads
Immersion cooling	Submerges servers in dielectric fluid	Very low	Extreme density, AI/HPC, edge micro data centers

CRAC (Computer Room Air Conditioner) units use a traditional refrigerant-based cooling cycle to cool and dehumidify air, like standard air conditioning. Meanwhile, CRAH (Computer Room Air Handler) units use chilled water supplied from a central plant or chiller to cool air via a heat exchanger coil.

What is the difference between DEC and IDEC?

Both systems use water evaporation’s natural heat absorption properties to reduce air temperature. This makes them considerably more energy-efficient than mechanical refrigeration.

• Direct Evaporative Cooling (DEC):
  Passes warm air through a saturated medium. Water then evaporates directly into the airflow. This process cools and humidifies the air simultaneously. While it is simple and energy-efficient, introducing moisture into the environment limits its use in sensitive IT environments.
• Indirect Evaporative Cooling (IDEC):
  IDEC uses a heat exchanger to separate the airflow from the water system, transferring heat is out of the data center air loop without adding moisture. This makes IDEC more suitable for enterprise and hyperscale IT environments that require stable humidity conditions.

Together, DEC and IDEC are frequently paired with free cooling strategies.

Should my business leverage direct-to-chip or immersion cooling?

Direct liquid cooling (direct-to-chip) and immersion cooling both use liquids to remove heat more efficiently than air, but they do so in different ways.

Direct-to-chip liquid cooling circulates a coolan, normally deionized water or a water-glycol mixture, through cold plates attached to high-heat components such as CPUs and GPUs. This tends to be the preferred option for businesses upgrading existing data centers to support AI and high-performance computing workloads.

By contrast, immersion cooling submerges entire servers in a non-conductive immersion cooling fluid to absorb heat directly from all components. This strategy is most suitable for new deployments or specialized environments requiring extreme compute density and the highest possible cooling efficiency.

While direct liquid cooling targets specific hot spots, immersion cooling cools the entire server and can support even higher rack densities.

How to compare data center cooling types

All techniques imply different benefits and drawbacks. Here is a table of the top pros and cons of each, to help your business choose which technique is most suitable for its infrastructure:

Cooling type	Pros	Cons
Mechanical cooling	Lower initial costs Easy installation Predictable and stable temperature control Suitable for moderate heat loads	High energy consumption Expels hot air into environment Noise pollution Long-term costs can be high
Liquid Cooling (direct-to-chip systems)	Very high heat transfer Reduces energy usage Low noise pollution Supports high-performance servers	High initial investment Higher installation complexity Requires plumbing and monitoring systems Requires specialist maintenance Risk of leaks damaging equipment
Free cooling	Minimal financial investment Low environmental impact Simple installation and low maintenance	Dependent on external climate Often cannot work alone May be unsuitable for high-temperature or AI-heavy data centers
Immersion cooling	Maximum thermal efficiency Eliminates fans and air cooling Excellent for extreme density computing	High upfront cost Hardware compatibility constraints Maintenance requires specialist skills
DEC	Very energy-efficient Simple system design Low operational cost	Adds moisture directly to air stream Not suitable for all IT environments Water quality management required
IDEC	No moisture added to IT airflow More stable humidity control than DEC Good balance of efficiency and protection	More complex than DEC Higher capital cost Reduced efficiency compared to direct evaporation in some conditions
Adiabatic cooling	Improves air cooling efficiency Lower energy use than mechanical systems Effective in dry climates	Requires water supply Limited effectiveness in humid environments Humidity management required

What are the challenges in maintaining optimal cooling for data centers?

Despite advances, data center cooling faces ongoing challenges:

• Rising heat production from AI and machine learning workloads straining traditional cooling infrastructures.
• Managing water consumption, particularly in centers that rely on evaporative cooling technologies such as DEC and IDEC.
• Balancing refrigeration costs, operational reliability, and the common sustainable IT goals of reducing energy consumption, water usage, and carbon emissions.
• Adapting cooling methods to diverse climates and server densities, as technologies such as free cooling and evaporative cooling are not equally effective in all environments.
• Supporting the transition to liquid and immersion cooling, which may require new infrastructure, specialist expertise, and changes to operational processes.

Addressing these challenges requires careful planning of the types of cooling systems your business needs, the environmental conditions surrounding the facility, your data center maintenance strategy, and your infrastructure budget.

Optimizing your data center cooling for efficiency and sustainability

Optimizing your cooling infrastructure is critical to achieving overall data center energy efficiency and sustainability. Efficient cooling strategies include:

• Using data center heat exchangers to transfer heat without consuming excessive energy.
• Leveraging free cooling in cooler climates.
• Adopting liquid cooling for high-density computing environments where traditional air cooling is no longer efficient.
• Implementing AI-driven temperature management systems to reduce costs.
• Implementing hot aisle/cold aisle containment and airflow management to prevent the mixing of hot and cold air and improve cooling efficiency.
• Using evaporative cooling systems in suitable climates to reduce reliance on mechanical refrigeration.

Balancing efficiency and reliability ensures continuous operation while minimizing both operational costs and environmental impact.

Modern innovations in cooling technologies

Advances in cooling technologies are helping data centers improve energy efficiency, reduce costs, and support increasingly demanding workloads. Liquid cooling solutions, AI-driven temperature management, and modular cooling systems are allowing businesses to manage higher rack densities while improving cooling precision and scalability.

Liquid and immersion cooling

Liquid cooling technologies, including direct-to-chip and immersion cooling, are becoming increasingly common in AI and high-performance computing (HPC) environments. Immersion cooling is one of the most advanced approaches to thermal management, with highly efficient heat removal that makes it particularly well suited to ultra-high-density AI and HPC deployments.

AI-powered temperature control

AI-driven cooling systems use real-time data from sensors throughout the data center to monitor temperatures, predict heat buildup, and automatically adjust cooling resources. These systems optimize airflow, cooling output, and equipment utilization to reduce energy consumption while maintaining stable operating conditions.

How can Evernex supports efficient data center cooling?

Evernex provides expert guidance and technical support for enterprise data centers. This way, we help companies enhance their energy efficiency, reduce operational costs, and ensure continuous business operations.

Our comprehensive services include multi-vendor, multi-model maintenance for servers, networking equipment, and storage. Through our Third-Party Maintenance (TPM) services, we help extend the lifecycle of your IT hardware.
Meanwhile, our Spare-as-a-Service^TM program offers speedy replacement of faulty components with certified refurbished components, including fans and power supplies.

By partnering with Evernex, your business benefits from expert advice and IT maintenance services.

We help you leverage efficient cooling strategies and innovative technologies to maintain high performance and long-term reliability across your entire data center infrastructure.

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