Heat Reclamation & Server Cabinet Cooling Systems
Sustainability, energy efficiency, and innovations in industrial processes are essential to Maxi-Cool in terms of our existing server cabinet products and all innovations and product development. Heat reclamation is an area of development for us, and we are especially interested in reclaiming and reusing heat energy from server cabinets. So, what is heat reclamation? How does it work, and why are we interested?
Heat reclamation is a generic term for various complex processes at different scales. Heat reclamation systems aim to recover the energy that would otherwise be wasted as heat and reroute it for another purpose. Reclaiming heat is achieved by capturing the waste heat from one source, transferring it to a heat exchanger, and then using it for heating or other purposes. New technologies like heat pumps, combined heat and power generation, and regenerative drives make this possible.
One significant source of carbon emissions in the UK is energy-emitted heat. These emissions are ubiquitous, from large-scale industrial sites to our offices and homes. Through retrofitting and redesigning, heat reclamation technology can be applied to buildings and waste heat sources inside buildings to reuse heat energy.
The benefits of installing a heat recovery system at any scale and location are increased energy efficiency and the associated environmental and financial benefits. Reclaimed heat energy can heat rooms, water or preheat materials for industrial use. While in previous years, the technology available may have only made small-scale heat reclamation possible, the field developments mean that advanced systems can recover heat from lower-temperature sources and deliver higher-temperature results. These technologies make heat reclamation more widely accessible and helpful.
A heat reclamation system in any form is ideal for companies with top priorities for sustainability and minimal waste. As we approach deadlines such as Net Zero by 2050 and the closer deadline of cutting carbon emissions in the UK by 68% by 2030, sustainability should be a top priority for all businesses and individuals. With heat reclamation, sustainability goals are more achievable.
Increasingly, there is much activity around reclaiming and reusing the heat that data centres generate. While data centres are critical to modern life, the industry is taking many initiatives to reduce environmental impact. Cooling systems and servers generate most of the energy in data centres, and sustainable improvements to servers and cooling options are developing and deployed rapidly. These improvements mainly relate to efficiency at scale and focus on maintaining data centres as large structures. Some arguments exist about large-scale data centres’ continued purpose and suitability for genuine sustainability. Localised and smaller-scale data centres could have the most significant impact on the environment and the biggest material benefit for new users. This argument has been successfully realised in the UK by Deep Green, and Heata is implementing other innovative and creative solutions at an even smaller and domestic scale.
Maxi-Cool is interested in repurposing the heat generated by servers and server cooling systems. A Maxi-Cool micro data centre in your office or factory could potentially heat hot water for you and your employees. Give us a call to find out more at 01733873262 or register your interest by email at info@maxi-cool.co.uk