Trends towards increasingly power-hungry processors, distributed data processing, and the need for greater sustainability are converging to create a perfect storm for an urgent re-think of data center cooling designs.

When it comes to high density racks, air is arguably not the most efficient solution. Liquid cooling solves high density challenges, but is a sledgehammer to crack a nut when it comes to low-density racks. Approaches which are flexible and optimised according to load and location are the way forward.

The hybridisation of edge cooling offers the opportunity to cool intelligently and precisely, make the best use of free cooling and heat re-use capabilities, and drive up ROI by exactly aligning CapEx and opex according to the local load requirement.