A methodology for the design of perforated tiles in raised floor data centers using computational flow analysis

An important aspect of the design of data centers involves sizing of the pe rforated floor tiles for return of cold air, the size of the space under th e raised floor, and placement of the DP equipment and modular chillers. The flow through individual perforated tiles needs to fulfill the cooling requ irements of the computer equipment placed adjacent to them. The novelty of this paper lies in the treatment of the volume under the raised floor as a uniformly pressurized plenum. The accuracy of the Pressurized Plenum model is demonstrated with reference to a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) anal ysis of the recirculating flow under the raised floor and the limits of its validity are also identified. The simple model of the volume under the rai sed floor enables use of the technique of flow network modeling (FNM) for t he prediction of the distribution of flow rates exiting from the various ti les, An inverse design method is proposed for one-step design of the perfor ated tiles and flow balancing plates for individual chillers. Subsequent us e of the FNM technique enables assessment of the performance of the actual system. Further, required design changes to an existing system can also be evaluated using the FNM analysis in a simple, quick, and accurate manner Th e resulting design approach is very simple and efficient, and is well suite d for the design of modern data centers.