Few people think about what’s happening on the other end of the cord to keep their Internet alive. Among other things is a vast network of data centers that quite literally contain the all of the files that constitute the billions of web pages, mobile apps, emails and any other networked bit of information. Just like your laptop, these machines get hot, and when these machines get hot, they tend to break down. And when they break down, you’re shit out of luck when it comes time to update your Facebook status or watch your daily dose of K-pop.Obviously, we’ve figured out how to keep servers cool a long time ago. But it turns outs that traditional methods are pretty bad for the environment. The classic approach is simply to cool the circuits with fans and air conditioning, neither of which is very energy efficient. Apple took heat from Greenpeace last year for using dirty energy — and a lot of it — to cool the data centers that keep iCloud humming along. Evidently, a single Apple data center in North Carolina sucks up 100 Megawatts of electricity when fully operational. That’s enough juice to power 80,000 average U.S. homes. According to Greenpeace, 61 percent of that electricity comes from burning coal. Boo.There must be a better way, and technology companies seem to be trying out new methods by the day. Some of them are pretty weird. Intel turned some heads this week by revealing the details of their new oil-cooled servers. With technology from Green Revolution Cooling, Intel’s servers use only 2 to 3 percent of their power for cooling, compared to 50 to 60 percent for traditional servers. This involves removing the fans from the motherboards, sealing up the hard drives and dunking the whole thing in an environmentally friendly oil bath. Surprisingly, the oil doesn’t harm the circuits one bit.Using liquid to keep servers cool is sort of old hat, though. Companies like IBM have been using water-based cooling system for years that pumps cold water into the server banks and lets it flow back out as hot water. In 2010, IBM even whipped together a new system that then converted the warm water into heating for nearby offices. Google one-upped this approach by pumping in waste water to keep their data center in Georgia cool. Other companies are experimenting with nanoparticles added to the water to improve its cooling ability.Then there’s the ultra practical approach: build data centers in cold climates. Facebook’s first data center outside of the United States is currently being built in Luleå, Sweden just 62 miles south of the Arctic Circle. Up there near the North Pole, the average temperature is a chilly 35.6º F meaning they have to invest a minimal amount of energy in cooling costs. To boot, the power that they do use will be supplied by a nearby hydroelectric plant. Similarly, Google built a server farm in an old paper mill near Hamima, Finland.
And finally, there’s the U.S. government’s approach. If servers are too hot, just open a window.
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