With the changing scenario where most of our traditional manual works are rapidly being automated, the need for Data Centers is increasing rapidly. Side by side the need for innovative data center cooling is also increasing apace.
In a very simple language, a data center is a place or physical facility that hosts IT equipment like: servers, networking devices, and many other devices to store, sort, process and distribute data and applications. A data center may be either owned by the user organisation or it may belong to the service provider.
Because of the presence of lots of electronic equipment, any data center produces huge amount of heat during its operation – that needs cooling. Any deviation from the optimum level of cooling in the data centers may cause malfunctioning of the equipment, their failure, and eventually lead to an incident of fire.
Cooling systems in data centers
A data center may be air-cooled or liquid-cooled depending on its size, design and the technology selected. With the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and High-Performance Computing (HPC), the number of liquid-cooled data centers is increasing fast, and globally many a company has started offering its innovative components and solutions in this field.
Today all over the world the cost of space is increasing. Thus, everywhere the priority is for designing more and more compact data centers where liquid-cooling is a much more effective method. Today, I will present here a few such recent developments centering around the liquid-cooling systems.
Growth of the data center liquid cooling market
According to a recent report from the world’s leading source for international market research reports and market data, Research And Markets, the data center liquid cooling market is experiencing a remarkable growth, with its size expected to expand from $4.18 billion in 2024 to $5.17 billion in 2025, marking a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 23.7%. By 2029, the market is forecast to reach $13.22 billion, at an impressive CAGR of 26.5%.
This surge is driven by escalating data storage needs, the rise of edge computing, micro data centers, and heightened emphasis on environmental sustainability, data security and regulatory compliance.
Focusing on the current trend, the report states that the increasing number of data centers and higher server density are significant factors propelling market growth. As businesses heavily rely on data centers for critical operations like computation and networking, the demand for liquid cooling systems that manage increased heat loads in high-density server environments grows. For instance, Stellarix, a data center and cloud provider, reported a significant increase in IoT-connected devices, spurring data centers to adopt liquid cooling for rack densities reaching up to 200 kW.
A key growth driver
Investment in data centers remains a key growth driver for liquid cooling technologies – notes the report. As digital transformation progresses, and with it the demand for cloud services, the U.S. data center market is projected to grow from $99.97 billion in 2023 to $128.46 billion by 2028. Companies like ActiveBatch by Redwood are advancing in automating complex IT workflows, enhancing data-driven decision-making capabilities.
Technological innovation in cooling
Huawei’s advancements underline the industry’s focus on technological innovation in cooling. The FusionModule2000 6.0, launched in November 2022, exemplifies cutting-edge liquid cooling solutions designed for enhanced energy efficiency and advanced modular installations.
Vertiv’s introduction of the Liebert XDU, a water-efficient liquid cooling system, illustrates the trend towards environmentally sustainable solutions that significantly reduce carbon emissions in data centers.
A few recent technological advancements in this field
Rack-scale liquid-cooled systems
According to a recent blog from NVIDIA, “Traditionally, data centers have relied on air cooling – where mechanical chillers circulate chilled air to absorb heat from servers, helping them maintain optimal conditions. But as AI models increase in size, and the use of AI reasoning models rises, maintaining those optimal conditions is not only getting harder and more expensive – but also more energy-intensive.
While data centers once operated at 20 kW per rack, today’s hyperscale facilities can support over 135 kW per rack, making it an order of magnitude harder to dissipate the heat generated by high-density racks. To keep AI servers running at peak performance, a new approach is needed for efficiency and scalability.
One key solution is liquid cooling – by reducing dependence on chillers and enabling more efficient heat rejection, liquid cooling is driving the next generation of high-performance, energy-efficient AI infrastructure.
The NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 and the NVIDIA GB300 NVL72 are rack-scale, liquid-cooled systems designed to handle the demanding tasks of trillion-parameter large language model inference. Their architecture is also specifically optimized for test-time scaling accuracy and performance, making it an ideal choice for running AI reasoning models while efficiently managing energy costs and heat.
Historically, cooling alone has accounted for up to 40% of a data center’s electricity consumption, making it one of the most significant areas where efficiency improvements can drive down both operational expenses and energy demands.
Liquid cooling helps mitigate costs and energy use by capturing heat directly at the source. Instead of relying on air as an intermediary, direct-to-chip liquid cooling transfers heat in a technology cooling system loop. That heat is then cycled through a coolant distribution unit via liquid-to-liquid heat exchanger, and ultimately transferred to a facility cooling loop. Because of the higher efficiency of this heat transfer, data centers and AI factories can operate effectively with warmer water temperatures – reducing or eliminating the need for mechanical chillers in a wide range of climates.
The NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 rack-scale, liquid-cooled system, built on the NVIDIA Blackwell platform, offers exceptional performance while balancing energy costs and heat. It packs unprecedented compute density into each server rack, delivering 40x higher revenue potential, 30x higher throughput, 25x more energy efficiency and 300x more water efficiency than traditional air-cooled architectures. Newer NVIDIA GB300 NVL72 systems built on the Blackwell Ultra platform boast a 50x higher revenue potential and 35x higher throughput with 30x more energy efficiency.”
Split-flow technology
According to the information available from CoolIT, its OMNI coldplates with Split-Flow technology deliver up to a 30% performance boost compared to standard coldplates. CoolIT coldplate cooling systems can be designed to capture 100% of a server’s heat from CPUs, GPUs, memory, I/O, power supplies and other components.
CoolIT Systems specializes in scalable liquid cooling technology for the world’s most demanding computing environments. A 24-year pioneer in microprocessor liquid cooling systems, CoolIT’s technology cools over 5 million GPUs and CPUs globally.
In the AI, high-performance computing and enterprise data center markets, CoolIT partners with global processor and server design leaders to develop the most efficient and reliable liquid cooling technology for their leading-edge products. Through its modular Direct Liquid Cooling (DLC) technology, CoolIT enables dramatic increases in rack densities, component performance and power efficiencies. Together, CoolIT and its partners are leading the way for the widespread adoption of accelerated and advanced computing.
Data cooling hoses to maintain stable cooling cycles
Continental has recently introduced its latest innovation in data center cooling solutions: DataGuard and FlexCool premium data cooling hoses. Designed for various cooling applications, including direct-to-chip single-phase cooling; these advanced hoses ensure the reliable operation of sensitive electronic components by preventing overheating, malfunctions, data corruption, and hardware damage. Designed to optimise cooling efficiency, these hoses contribute to lower energy costs, reduced carbon footprints, and improved working conditions in data centers.
Epilogue
According to Research And Markets, regionally, North America dominated the liquid cooling market in 2024, though Asia-Pacific is anticipated to be the fastest-growing area in the forecast period (2025 – 2029).
While liquid cooling, including water-based systems, will continue to dominate the market for large scale data centers, the days of air cooling are not yet the things of past. Perhaps the best example in support of this expectation is Daikin’s recent launch of Pro-C Computer Room Air Handler (CRAH), extending Daikin data center product portfolio.
By P. K. Chatterjee (PK)
