Alibaba: open source and self-developed liquid cooling data center technology

In recent days, , Alibaba announced that it would “ Technical specification for immersed liquid cooled data center ” Open to the whole society . This specification aims to provide a design basis for the construction of the next generation green base data center with a set of standard processes , Through the popularization of liquid cooling technology , Reduce the energy consumption level of the whole society . A preliminary estimate , If the data centers all over the country adopt liquid cooling technology , Save hundreds of billions of kilowatt hours a year .

2009 Year to 2019 year , It's a decade when cloud computing has led the industry to change dramatically , The Internet company represented by Alibaba is leading by its insight and solid technology IT Independent R & D and technological innovation of infrastructure , In addition to liquid cooling technology , Alibaba's infrastructure business unit has also independently developed 400G Optical module 、 Storage unit 、 Intelligent power supply technology and other innovative products , Pursue the ultimate improvement of computing power .

2016 year , Alibaba launched the world's first immersion liquid cooled server , Soak the server in a special insulating coolant , The heat generated by calculation can be directly absorbed into the external circulation for cooling , The total energy consumption for heat dissipation is almost zero . The heat conduction efficiency of this form is 100 times higher than that of traditional air cooling , The effect of saving energy is more than 70%.

Relative to tradition IT, Behind the liquid cooling data center are great innovations and revolutionary changes , The change of hardware and system needs a lot of manpower and material resources , At present, this field is almost blank , There is no standard to draw on . The whole set of Alibaba open source specifications , Covering the design of the data center 、 The construction of the 、 Deploy 、 Operation and maintenance , Through the integration of design and rational planning , Reduce deployment costs , Improve stability , Leading the data center to be efficient 、 clean 、 Intensive green development path .