Great, let's boil the planet
That's what they're looking to avoid, by using passive cooling instead of less efficient refrigeration.
Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
51–60 of 397 posts
Re: Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
#52At what point does this become a problem? They're using the naturally cool sea water to regulate the temperature in the container, but that heat needs to go somewhere... it heats the water. If this becomes a popular alternative to classic server farms, at what point does it start to increase the temperature of the sea? I know, the oceans are big, but so is our data.
If my calculation is correct, the total annual electricity production in the world (I used 20 279 PWh) would heat up the oceans (1 347 000 000 km³ of water) by 0,0129°C. It's rather easy to calculate because one calorie is the energy required to heat up one gramme of water by one degree Celsius, the rest is just unit conversions, but I could have messed up anywhere of course. Even if I'm off by a few orders of magnit…
however will these values change depending upon the depth and hence more pressure?
Re: Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
#53At what point does this become a problem? They're using the naturally cool sea water to regulate the temperature in the container, but that heat needs to go somewhere... it heats the water. If this becomes a popular alternative to classic server farms, at what point does it start to increase the temperature of the sea? I know, the oceans are big, but so is our data.
> I know, the oceans are big, but so is our data.
Meh. The biggest data center (ChinaTel's Inner Mongolia Information Park) consumes about 150MWe, assuming all of it becomes waste heat it's basically nothing: a nuclear reactor (each plant has 2~8) releases 2Wt for each We it produces, and they're usually sized between 800 and 1300MWe.
Hell, earth averages 160W/m^2 from the sun, oceans cover 360m km^2, so oceans get 10^16 watts from the sun.
Not to say that it can't have a significant local effect, nuclear plants are strongly regulated to avoid heating their rivers too much (especially in warm summers), and again we're dealing with orders of magnitude more heat dumping heat waste in a very finite (though moving) amount of water.
Re: Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
If my calculation is correct, the total annual electricity production in the world (I used 20 279 PWh) would heat up the oceans (1 347 000 000 km³ of water) by 0,0129°C. It's rather easy to calculate because one calorie is the energy required to heat up one gramme of water by one degree Celsius, the rest is just unit conversions, but I could have messed up anywhere of course. Even if I'm off by a few orders of magnit…
I understand that this is just a back-of-the-napkin calculation, but I feel like the heating will have a more noticeable impact on the local environment (think 5km³), rather than considering all of our planet's oceans all at once.
> I understand that this is just a back-of-the-napkin calculation, but I feel like the heating will have a more noticeable impact on the local environment (think 5km³), rather than considering all of our planet's oceans all at once.
You're not putting all of the planet's datacenters within 5km^3 either. The calculation is fine.
Re: Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
#55At what point does this become a problem? They're using the naturally cool sea water to regulate the temperature in the container, but that heat needs to go somewhere... it heats the water. If this becomes a popular alternative to classic server farms, at what point does it start to increase the temperature of the sea? I know, the oceans are big, but so is our data.
All the big power plants use rivers for cooling. It doesn't seem to be a terribly big problem unless there is a drought.
Re: Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well you're making it sound as if the data centers being cooled somehow wouldn't happen otherwise. Seeing as how the alternative is to cool using A/C, surely it's the case of causing less harm than the alternative? Of course you could argue that the lower cost of this cooling method will create a larger demand for cheaper servers/data storage, which increases net harm, for which I have no answer.
> Of course you could argue that the lower cost of this cooling method will create a larger demand for cheaper servers/data storage, which increases net harm, for which I have no answer. That argument doensn't apply here: demand isn't currently being constrained by us being affraid of the environmental impact of datacenters.
edit: nevermind I can't read
Re: Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
#57I can see a few robotic hands doing magic under the sea while being operated remotely. Submarine drones deliver the hardware. I can see this helping MS to move into the space and a huge boost for robotics. It will get there eventually, I think the no maintenance is just to test if it is worth it before going all in
Re: Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
#58> Additionally because there are no people, we can take all the oxygen and most of the water vapour out of the atmosphere which reduces corrosion, which is a significant problem in data centres First time I hear corrosion is a problem in datacentres. I never noticed any corrosion on any machine at home or work. Does it have to do with the cooling of datacentres?
I had a PC I built and moved to a bungalow near the beach. Within the year it's power supply had rusted. My last PC in a relatively arid environment lasted 4 years. It's probably the "sea" environment that would pose corrosion issues.
Power supplies are usually plated or coated recycled "chinesium" steel. This is because it's incredibly cheap and has a half decent EMC outcome for the price. One little nick in the coating or plating and that's it though. Really they could use other materials such as cast aluminium, brass or copper but they are orders of magnitude more expensive.
If you look at some of the older electronic test equipment which was made with much higher standard materials it's not uncommon to find something that has been in a damp shed for three decades and powers up just fine after the dead spiders have been removed and the mould cleaned off. BUT at the time of manufacture they cost more than a mid-range car.
Re: Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Of course you could argue that the lower cost of this cooling method will create a larger demand for cheaper servers/data storage, which increases net harm, for which I have no answer. That argument doensn't apply here: demand isn't currently being constrained by us being affraid of the environmental impact of datacenters.
edit: nevermind I can't read
You don't believe demand isn't being constrained in the way I described? So you believe that people are looking at cats on facebook, and stop because they're worried about the environmental impact of facebook's datacenters? You're joking...
Re: Microsoft has sunk a data centre in the sea to investigate energy efficiency
#60> Prof Ian Bitterlin, a data centre consultant for nearly 30 years, is sceptical about the environmental impact of going underwater. > "You just end up with a warmer sea and bigger fish," he says. > And 90% of Europe's data centres are in big cities such as London and Madrid because that is where they are needed. > Microsoft's Ben Cutler insists the warming effect will be minimal - "the water just metres downstream w…
Not an expert either, but this might be a good way to think about it: on land or at sea, the machines produce the same amount of heat. On land, in general, the environment around the machines will be much warmer than the desired temp. Cooling on land is in general an active affair, which has to do with generating and controlling flow of fluid and/or maybe some kind of thermic reaction. Potentially at sea being plunged in cold water is sufficient to reach the desired temp, and cooling becomes a passive affair. All in all you are trying to displace the same amount of heat but through a more efficient medium. Correct me if I'm wrong.