An investigation on direct free cooling potential of climate in key cities of Turkey

Abstract

Data centers operating throughout the globe demanded up to 2% of world's electricity generation in the last decade, and they were responsible for the associated emissions and resources. There exists a potential of climate for times weather parameters comply with the environmental needs of our state of the art IT equipment, when the energy demand for cooling is offloaded to ambient air and both energy savings and reduction in emissions are realized, in so called Direct Free Cooling (DFC) mode of operation. In this research, the direct free cooling potential of climate is investigated for the top socioeconomically developed cities of Turkey, namely Istanbul, Ankara, and Izmir along with the city of Konya that is planned to almost double the data center whitespace area of Turkey, and Erzurum as the representative of a city with year-round cold ambient air temperatures and high elevation, in two different periods of time, a control period in the past and a subject period in future. The DFC potentials calculated for both periods of each city are compared within and between cities. The findings reported in this research should affect policy and investment making processes due to changing climate. The aim is to establish sustainable and efficient data center operations in harmony with the climate of Turkey's key cities, leading to lesser green house gas emissions and more development.