1. Introduction

Data centers are physical facilities that organizations use to host, store, and process their data and to run their digital services. With the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence technologies and other compute-intensive fields, the need for processing capacity and consequently the growth of data centers has increased significantly. At the same time, rising rack power density (especially for high-power workloads) has made power delivery and cooling more difficult, turning cooling into one of the main challenges in data center design and operation. Accordingly, engineers seek to maximize server cooling efficiency through appropriate cooling strategies, proper arrangement of servers and racks, and effective thermal management practices (such as controlling airflow paths and preventing hot and cold air mixing), while keeping equipment within allowable environmental conditions, reducing cooling energy consumption, and improving system reliability.

2. Objectives

In this educational product, we simulate and evaluate the cooling of a data center using ANSYS Fluent. The training examines the importance of properly positioning cold-air supply outlets and other key parameters that improve rack cooling performance. A careful review of the results can provide a clear and practical understanding of how to design a data center effectively.

3. Results and Discussion

The results of this simulation clearly highlight the importance of outlet placement. In this study, we observed that positioning the cold-air outlet too close to the cooling unit can lead to cold-air bypass and wasted airflow, which reduces the efficiency of the cooling units. Likewise, an excessively high supply (discharge) pressure can cause a similar effect: the cold air streams past the front of the racks without effectively entering them, resulting in additional cold-air waste and reduced cooling effectiveness.