IT Room Cooling Assessment with CFD Visualization
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current IT-room-design systems fail to provide accurate and easily comprehensible cooling-performance assessments, requiring extensive training and expertise, and often rely solely on temperature values without incorporating capture indices like hot-aisle capture index (HACI) and cold-aisle capture index (CACI), leading to inaccurate results and inefficient energy use.
Innovation Solution
An IT-room-design system that includes a processor to receive IT-device information, determine cooling-airflow-supply and return effectiveness, and display a cooling-effectiveness metric via a graphical user interface (GUI), using CFD software to calculate and visualize CACI and HACI, enabling a more comprehensive assessment of cooling performance.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If temperature values alone are used to assess cooling performance, then the assessment is simple, but the accuracy is poor
Solution Approach 1:
The patent combines multiple assessment parameters including temperature values, capture indices (HACI, CACI), and airflow effectiveness metrics into a unified cooling-performance assessment system. This merging of previously separate evaluation criteria enables accurate assessment while maintaining system manageability through integrated analysis.
Solution Approach 2:
The assessment system is designed to evaluate multiple aspects of cooling performance simultaneously - temperature control, airflow capture effectiveness, and energy efficiency - through a single multi-functional framework that can be applied across different data center configurations.
2Measurement precision
If capture indices (HACI, CACI) are incorporated into the assessment, then the cooling-performance assessment accuracy is improved, but the difficulty of detecting and measuring increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations as an intermediary tool to calculate capture indices and airflow effectiveness. This intermediary approach transforms difficult-to-measure physical airflow patterns into computable parameters, enabling accurate assessment without requiring complex physical measurements.
Solution Approach 2:
The system replaces direct physical measurement of complex airflow patterns with computational modeling. Instead of using complex mechanical sensors and measurement equipment to directly detect airflow capture, the patent uses CFD software to simulate and calculate capture indices, simplifying the measurement process while maintaining accuracy.
3Loss of energy
If comprehensive cooling assessment is performed, then the energy efficiency improvement is enhanced, but the time required for assessment increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent performs cooling-performance assessments during the design and planning phases of data center construction, rather than after the facility is built. This preliminary action allows optimization of airflow patterns and cooling system configuration before implementation, improving energy efficiency without requiring time-consuming retrofits or post-construction modifications.
Data Source
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Figure 2C
AI summary
Examples of the disclosure include a method comprising receiving information-technology-device information indicative of IT equipment and including information-technology-device-location information and temperature information; determining, based on the information-technology-device information, an IT-equipment-cooling assessment; receiving cooling-unit information indicative of air output by the IT equipment to the cooling units and/or provided by the cooling units to the IT equipment; determining, based on the cooling-unit information, a cooling-airflow-return effectiveness indicative of how effectively the cooling units capture air output by the IT equipment and/or a cooling-airflow-supply effectiveness indicative of how effectively the cooling units provide air to the IT equipment; and displaying a simulation display depicting the IT equipment, an effectiveness indicator for the cooling-airflow-return effectiveness and/or the cooling-airflow-supply effectiveness, and a respective IT indicator for each IT-equipment-cooling assessment, wherein each respective IT indicator is displayed in association with a respective unit of IT equipment to which the respective IT indicator corresponds.