Specify Requirements Around Liquid Cooling Versus Evaporative Air Cooling

Data centers in water-scarce areas may consider prohibiting evaporative air cooling techniques. This is because cooling data centers is extraordinarily resource intensive. There are generally two ways data centers can cool their servers: server liquid cooling (a process that delivers a liquid coolant directly to the graphics processing units, and that does not consume water) and air cooling (which uses water evaporation and is therefore a more water-intensive method). Some data centers also use cooling towers to cool their facilities; this method is very resource-intensive. While technology may change over time, cities should first assess whether data centers are worth the resource extraction required.1

Note: This distinction is not intuitive! Liquid cooling techniques use little to no water, and air cooling techniques use significant amounts of water.

Strong example

The Southern Nevada Water Authority adopted a moratorium on new evaporative cooling systems in commercial and industrial buildings because they are highly water intensive.

  1. Yañez-Barnuevo, Data Centers and Water Consumption. ↩︎