Using the Sea To Cool Your Data Center

1sockchuck writes "We haven't yet seen signs of the Google Navy of seagoing data centers that use the ocean for power and cooling. But data center developers are planning to use sea water air conditioning in a new project on the island nation of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean. Cold water from deep-sea currents would be piped ashore to be used in a heat exchanger for the data center facility. A similar system has been used to replace the chillers at Cornell University, which draws cold water from Lake Cayuga. The Cornell system cost $50 million, but has slashed cooling-related energy usage by 86 percent."

Comments

Although it uses less electricity, not "green"

[Useful Wheat]

Although this solution is certainly "low power" by no means should it be considered to be entirely green. I work as an engineer on many projects that involve sea water, and when you're using it for a cooling source you typically need to inject some sort of chemical to sterilize the water to keep growths off your heat exchangers (barnacles are sort of a pain in the ass in your exchangers). As a result, using sea water for large scale cooling operations is prohibited in large regions of the United States (specifically the gulf coast) mostly over concerns that the large amounts of warm bleached water will damage the ecosystem. Although, that issue aside, using the ocean as a cooling medium is a great idea, and has been used reliably by power plants for many years.

Re:Environmental Concerns

[RobVB]

The total mass of the oceans is about 1.4*10^21 kg. The total mass of the atmosphere is about 5*10^18 kg. That means the oceans weigh about 300 times as much as the atmosphere.

The heat capacity of water is about 4000 J * kg ^ -1 * K ^ -1. The heat capacity of air is about 1 kJ * kg ^ -1 * K ^ -1, or about 1000 J * kg ^ -1 * K ^ -1.

So since there's 300 times as much water as there is air, and the heat capacity of water is 4 times larger, heating up the atmosphere by 1200 degree Celsius would take the same amount of energy as heating up the oceans by 1 degree Celsius. This may not prove or disprove your point, I just started thinking about numbers when you said "raising the temperature of a body of water by a few degrees".