Coolerado Chills Snow & Ice Data Center

You'd think that The National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) would take data center cooling seriously.  Indeed it does. The NSIDC is based in Boulder, Colorado, and supports research into the world's "frozen realms," including glaciers and polar climates. The organization recently undertook an overhaul of its data center cooling system that will reduce its energy spending by about 70 percent, according to David Gallaher,  the manager of IT services. The NSIDC uses outside air in a free cooling system when the temperature is  below 70 degrees. When it gets warmer than 70, the data center switches to an indirect evaporative cooling system from Coolerado. The group is also using a solar power array to provide supplemental power - including powering the Coolerado units in the event of a utility outage. In this three-minute video, Gallaher provides an overview of the system.

For more on energy efficiency, see our Green Data Centers Channel. For additional video, check out our DCK video archive and the Data Center Videos channel on YouTube.