3 When To Use Immersion vs. Direct Liquid Cooling
Immersion cooling isn't universally applicable to every data center scenario. Understanding when it delivers maximum value requires analyzing your specific infrastructure challenges, workload demands, and business objectives. Power Efficiency In power-constrained environments where cooling consumes a disproportionate share of available capacity, immersion cooling's 90% energy reduction can unlock significant additional compute potential. Similarly, when organizations need to double compute capacity within the same physical footprint, the density advantages of immersion cooling become essential rather than merely beneficial. Urban data centers face particular pressure in this regard, as high real estate costs make maximum density utilization financially critical. Water Usage Data centers globally consume 560 billion liters of water annually and could reach 1,200 billion liters by 2030 due to AI workload growth. A typical 100MW data center uses 2 million liters daily, rivaling small towns' consumption. Most centers use evaporative cooling, where water absorbs heat and turns to steam, requiring constant fresh water supply. The industry measures Water Usage Effectiveness (WUE) at 1.9 liters per kWh average. Major hyper scalers are adopting water sustainability measures including immersion cooling, which Microsoft research shows can reduce water usage by 31% to 52% compared to traditional air cooling.
Comparison of Data Center Cooling Technologies Air Cooled Data Centers Direct Liquid Cooling (DLC)
Single Phase Immersion Cooling
Power Efficiency
Lowest
Varies
Highest
High (evaporative towers)
Reduced/Variable (can be waterless) Reduced (less server noise) Lower (stable temps, less dust)
Low to None (often waterless)
Water Usage
High (fans, HVAC) Higher (dust, humidity, heat stress)
Near Silent (server area)
Noise Pollution
Lowest (stable, sealed environment)
Equipment Failure Rate
10
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