JP6081731B2 - Air conditioning system for information processing equipment room - Google Patents

Description

  The present invention relates to an air conditioning system for an information processing equipment room.

  With the development of information processing technology, the amount of heat generated by information processing equipment has been increasing. Along with this, the processing amount of the air conditioning system in the information processing equipment room for cooling the information processing equipment is also increasing, and the development of air conditioning technology capable of efficiently cooling the information processing equipment is being carried out.

  By the way, in the information processing equipment room, racks that contain information processing equipment are arranged, so that the airflow flowing from the air conditioning outlet is deflected at the rack or the end of the rack to generate a drift, or the airflow is It may peel at the end of the rack and cause contraction. If this countermeasure for deflection and drift is not implemented, local heat spot formation by hot air recirculation or the like is allowed. When local heat spots are allowed, the temperature of the information processing equipment room should be kept low so that information processing equipment near the heat spots will not cause serious temporary damage such as thermal runaway or stoppage due to protective action. Operation to set is done, and it becomes a factor of increase in energy consumption.

  In order to prevent local heat spots, the present applicant has proposed the system of Patent Document 1. In the system of Patent Document 1, the inside of the information processing equipment room is partitioned by a rectifying member so as to be divided into a first region having a blow-out port from which cool air blows and a second region having an intake surface of the rack. A ventilation resistance is provided between the region and the second region to regulate the flow of cold air, and the generation of vortices and turbulence is suppressed to prevent the generation of heat spots.

JP 2012-21133 A

  As described above, in the system of Patent Document 1, since the first region and the second region are partitioned by the rectifying member, the periphery of the second region is surrounded by the rectifying member when viewed from the first region where the air outlet is located. It will be. For this reason, the light transmittance from the 1st field to the 2nd field is low, and restrictions may be received when installing lighting or installing a security camera.

  In addition, when a filter is used as the rectifying member, it is desirable to periodically clean or replace the filter in order to prevent performance degradation due to clogging with dust and the like, and maintainability may be reduced. Furthermore, a heat spot is generated at the end due to the drift in the inflow direction of the cold air.

  Accordingly, an object of the present application is to provide an air conditioning system for an information processing equipment room that can appropriately supply cold air to a rack that accommodates information processing equipment and that is highly light transmissive or maintainable.

In order to solve the above problems, the air conditioning system of the present invention is:
An air conditioning system that performs air conditioning of an information processing equipment room in which racks that contain information processing equipment are arranged in a row,
An air outlet that opens toward the rack in the information processing equipment room and blows out cool air for cooling the information processing equipment into the information processing equipment room;
The rack rows are arranged side by side with the air intake surfaces of the rack rows facing each other, a region to which cool air is supplied between the air intake surfaces facing each other is defined as a cold air region, and the cold air region having a longitudinal arrangement direction of the racks A first rectifying member that is provided at a longitudinal end of the rack and has a plurality of surfaces parallel to the arrangement direction of the racks, and adjusts the flow direction and flow velocity of the cold air flowing into the cold air region;
A second rectifying member is provided at an upper portion of the cold air region, and has a plurality of surfaces orthogonal to the arrangement direction of the racks, and adjusts the flow direction and flow velocity of the cold air flowing into the cold air region.

  The rectifying member may be a vertical louver having a vertical slat, a horizontal louver having a horizontal slat, a lattice louver, or a honeycomb louver.

  The first rectifying member may be a louver having a slat parallel to the intake surface of the rack.

  The second rectifying member may be provided from the top of the rack in one row provided as a pair with the cold air region interposed therebetween to the top of the rack in the other row.

  The second rectifying member may be provided between the upper part of the rack and the ceiling of the information processing device room.

  The air conditioning system may include a flat plate parallel to an air supply surface of the rack on a part of the wing plate provided on the second rectifying member on the rack side.

  A flat surface made of a non-breathable material may be provided flush with the intake surface of the rack between the first rectifying member and the rack.

  A plurality of the air outlets may be provided at different positions in the horizontal direction, and cool air may be blown out from some of the air outlets.

  ADVANTAGE OF THE INVENTION According to this invention, cold air can be supplied appropriately to the rack which accommodated the information processing apparatus, and the air conditioning system of the information processing apparatus room with high light transmittance can be provided.

1 is a configuration diagram of a data center according to Embodiment 1. FIG. It is the figure which showed the path | route through which return air flows. It is a top view which shows some arrangement | positioning of an air conditioning system. It is explanatory drawing of a 1st rectification | straightening member. It is explanatory drawing at the time of making a 1st rectification | straightening member into a double sliding door. It is a figure of the 1st rectification member and the 2nd rectification member seen from the cold aisle inside. It is explanatory drawing of a 1st rectification member and a 2nd rectification member. It is a figure showing a course through which cold air flows. It is a figure of the function of a flat panel. It is a top view which shows the arrangement | positioning of a part of air conditioning system which concerns on Embodiment 2. FIG. It is a figure which shows the simulation result when there is no rectifying member. It is a figure which shows the simulation result at the time of using a louver as a rectification | straightening member. It is a figure which shows the simulation result at the time of using the rectification | straightening member of Embodiment 2. FIG. It is a figure which shows the structural example of the rectification | straightening member which concerns on Embodiment 3. FIG.

<Embodiment 1>
FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of a data center 101 in which an air conditioning system 100 according to the first embodiment is arranged, FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a path through which return air flows, and FIG. 3 is a partial arrangement of the air conditioning system 100. FIG.

  In the data center (information processing equipment room) 101, as shown in FIG. 1, a server room 103 has a large number of racks 102 in which information processing equipment such as servers and communication devices for performing various arithmetic processes and database management are accommodated. Are lined up. The server room 103 is provided with a large number of air conditioning units 104 that generate cool air to be supplied to each rack 102.

  Each rack 102 is provided with a cooling fan for cooling the information processing device, and is configured such that the front surface of the rack serves as an intake surface and the other serves as an exhaust surface. The cooling fan of the information processing device in each rack 102 is controlled in rotational speed so as to change every moment according to the load state and suction temperature of the information processing device accommodated in the rack. Alternatively, it may move at a constant rotational speed. When there is a gap in the rack 102 or between adjacent racks 102 because the information processing device is not installed, it is preferable to close the gap with a panel or the like that prevents the warm air from flowing around.

  The air conditioning unit 104 includes a cooling coil and an electric fan, and cools the air in the server room 103.

  In the data center 101 according to the first embodiment, a floor surface 106 is provided between the concrete slab 105B and the server room 103, so that a double floor structure is provided, and between the concrete slab 105B and the floor surface 106 is provided. The space is a cool air passage. However, the present invention is not limited to this, and a structure without the underfloor space in which the floor surface 106 is formed by the concrete slab 105B may be used. Here, each rack 102 is installed on the floor surface 106.

  A ceiling board 107 is provided between the concrete slab 105U and the server room 103, and has a double ceiling structure. Therefore, as shown in FIG. 2, the air conditioning unit 104 sucks the exhaust of each rack 102 from the space 108U behind the ceiling formed between the ceiling board 107 and the concrete slab 105U through an opening provided on the upper surface. Cool down. Although FIG. 1 shows the structure of the first floor of the data center 101, the structure of FIG.

  Then, the cooled air is sent into the server room 103 from the air outlet 104A provided on the front surface (for example, in the vicinity of the inner wall of the server room 103) as viewed from the end side wall of the rack row 109 in which the racks 102 are aligned. The air conditioning unit 104 may be one in which a coil and a fan are housed in separate casings, and both are connected by a duct. The air conditioning unit 104 may be a ceiling-suspended type or a ceiling-embedded type, or may be installed in a separate room and extended to the server room 103 by a duct only at the air outlet. In this case, the air outlet of the air conditioning unit 104 may be provided on the ceiling board 107 so as to blow out from the ceiling. In other words, there is a system in which a blower outlet is provided in addition to the upper part between the rack rows, an exhaust port is provided in the floor between the rack rows, and the underfloor chamber is used as a return air duct. The present invention can also be applied to a system in which a non-breathable duct is communicated with a ceiling chamber and is set as a return air path.

A plurality of air conditioning units 104 are provided so as to have redundancy. In the first embodiment, as shown in FIG. 3, three air conditioning units are provided for the four rack rows 109. Each air conditioning unit 104 has the ability to cool the four rack rows 109 by two, and one air conditioning unit 104 is redundant. That is, when one of the three air-conditioning units 104 stops due to failure or maintenance, the remaining two air-conditioning units 104 are operated. That is, when a plurality of air outlets 104A of the air conditioning units 104 are provided at different positions in the horizontal direction and some of the air conditioning units 104 are stopped, cold air is blown out from the air outlets 104A of the remaining air conditioning units 104. become. For this reason, it is conceivable that the airflow is more distorted than when the cold air is blown out from all the air outlets 104A. However, in the air conditioning system 100 of the first embodiment, the influence of the turbulence of the airflow is affected by the rectifying member as described later. It is suppressed and the occurrence of hot spots is prevented. FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a part of the rack row 109 and the air conditioning unit 104 installed in the data center, and the arrangement of the rack row 109 and the air conditioning unit 104 in the data center is 4 rack rows and the air conditioning unit. It is not limited to three. For example, in the first embodiment, a large number of rack rows 109 and air conditioning units 104 are provided in the data center 101 at this ratio. The ratio between the rack row 109 and the air conditioning unit 104 is not limited to this, and can be arbitrarily set according to conditions such as the number of racks 102 included in one rack row 109 and the capacity of the air conditioning unit 104.

  In the data center 101, the directions of the intake surface and the exhaust surface of each rack 102 constituting one rack row 109 are aligned so that the cool air is efficiently supplied to each rack 102. The two rack rows 109 facing each other are arranged so as to face each other on the intake surface or the exhaust surface. By installing each rack 102 in this way, a path through which cool air flows and a path through which warm air flows are alternately formed between the rack rows 109. Hereinafter, a passage (cold air region) in which cool air flows surrounded by a pair of rack rows 109 facing the intake surface is referred to as a cold aisle C, and a passage in which warm air flows surrounded by a pair of rack rows 109 facing the exhaust surfaces. This is called Hot Isle H. The cold aisle C also serves as a maintenance worker's passage and work space.

  A non-breathable partition plate 110 that separates the hot aisle H and the cold aisle C is provided between both ends of the two rack rows 109 sandwiching one hot aisle H or between the rack row 109 and the ceiling board 107. For example, it is erected continuously along the rack row 109 in contact with the upper end of the rack 102 and the lower end of the ceiling board 107. Since the upper part of the hot aisle H in the ceiling board 107 is open, the warm air in the hot aisle H surrounded by the partition plate 110 flows to the space 108U behind the ceiling without going around to the cold aisle C side. become.

  That is, the area through which the cool air blown from the air conditioning unit 104 in the rack row 109 passes until it reaches the intake surface of the rack row 109 is separated from the area through which the warm air exhausted from the rack row 109 returns to the air conditioning unit 104. It has been.

  In the cold aisle C, the longitudinal direction of the cold aisle C is the cold air that is adjusted in temperature by the air conditioning unit 104 and supplied horizontally from the air outlet 104A provided on the wall surface of the server room 103, for example. Inflow from.

  In the present embodiment, the first rectifying member 111 that has a plurality of surfaces parallel to the arrangement direction of the racks 102 at the longitudinal end portion of the cold aisle C and adjusts the flow direction and flow velocity of the cold air flowing into the cold aisle C is provided. Prepare. Further, a second rectifying member 112 that adjusts the flow direction of the cold air flowing into the cold aisle C is provided on the cold aisle C, for example, on the side of the cold aisle that is flush with the rack intake surface of the cold aisle C.

Here, as shown in FIG. 4, the first rectifying member 111 includes a plurality of flat blades parallel to the intake surface of the rack 102, and the cold air flowing between the blades and flowing into the cold aisle C is sucked into the intake surface of the rack 102. Adjust the inflow direction of cold air so that it is parallel to Thereby, even when one air-conditioning unit 104 stops and the position where the cold air blows out is uneven, the drift can be suppressed. That is, when the air-conditioning unit 104 stops due to failure or maintenance, the airflow is more disturbed than the design state assuming all-unit operation, and the airflow / flow vectors change. The louver 1A regulates this and guides cold air of the same vector to the cold aisle C. In addition, the louver of 1 A of louvers is not restricted to what was fixed in parallel. For example, the angle of the louver of the louver 1A is movable, and the blade is temporarily not in a parallel state due to contact with a maintenance worker or a carriage, or the blade is temporarily directed toward the center of the server when the server is under a low load. Even if it is narrowed down, it can be said that the equipment in which the slats are substantially parallel during steady operation adopts the present invention. Here, “parallel” is not limited to being strictly parallel, but may be any degree as long as the cool air can be guided substantially parallel to the intake surface. In the present embodiment, the thickness of the slats is 5 mm, the installation interval (pitch) between the slats is 50 mm, and the aperture ratio is 90%. The aperture ratio is not limited to this and may be set arbitrarily. For example, the aperture ratio can be set low by increasing the thickness of the slats without changing the pitch. Also, the aperture ratio can be set low by narrowing the pitch without changing the thickness of the slats. By setting the aperture ratio low, the airflow resistance is increased, and the effect of reducing the wind speed of the cold air can also be obtained. However, if the aperture ratio is too low, the light transmittance is lowered. Therefore, it is preferable to determine the aperture ratio by combining the light transmittance and the effect of reducing the wind speed. For example, the aperture ratio is desirably 70% to 95%.

  Moreover, the 1st rectification | straightening member 111 is provided so that opening and closing is possible, and may be used as an entrance / exit door (rectification | straightening door) at the time of entering / exiting the cold aisle C. When the first rectifying member 111 is used as an entrance / exit door, it is possible to maintain a space between the slats and to provide strength as a door by fitting a plurality of slats into the frame or providing ribs for connecting the slats. It is desirable to reinforce so that

  The doorway door (first rectifying member) 111 may be provided as a hinged door by providing a hinge on a side in contact with the rack 102, or may be provided as a sliding door by providing rails on the floor surface 106 and the ceiling board 107. When the doorway door 111 is used as a sliding door, it is preferable that the doorway door 111 is a double door that opens left and right from the center as shown in FIG. As a result, even when the width CW of the longitudinal end portion of the cold aisle C, that is, the width of the entrance door 11 is longer than the width RW of the longitudinal end portion of the rack row 109, the entrance doors 111 opened to the left and right respectively Fits in width RW and does not get in the way.

  FIG. 6 is a view of the first rectifying member 111 and the second rectifying member 112 viewed from the inside of the cold aisle C.

  The second rectifying member 112 is a louver provided with a plurality of slats having a plane (xy plane) orthogonal to the arrangement direction of the racks 102. The second rectifying member 112 may have a flat panel 2B parallel to the intake surface (yz plane) of the rack 102 at the lower part of the slat 2A.

  FIG. 7 is an explanatory diagram of the first rectifying member 111 and the second rectifying member 112. The first rectifying member 111 and the second rectifying member 112 are louvers configured by arranging a plurality of flat slats in parallel, and the interval (pitch) between the slats in the inflow direction of the cold air. It is narrower than the width.

  In the first embodiment, an example of a vertical louver in which the slats are elongated in the vertical direction is shown, but the present invention is not limited thereto, and a horizontal louver elongated in the horizontal direction may be used. That is, when the air outlet is provided in addition to the above-described upper part between the rack rows, a remarkable effect can be obtained by making the louver 2A horizontal. Moreover, the lattice-like louver which combined the vertical slat and the horizontal slat may be sufficient. Further, a honeycomb louver may be used.

  As described above, in the first embodiment, a resistor such as a filter is not provided as a rectifying member, and a louver is used as the first rectifying member 111 and the second rectifying member 112, so that light transmittance above the rack is high.

  FIG. 8 is a diagram illustrating a path through which cold air flows. In the first embodiment, the cold aisle C is partitioned by the rectifying member and the partition plate 110, and the cool air blown from the outlet 104A passes through the first rectifying member 111, so that the wind direction is parallel to the intake surface. Arranged in the direction. Further, the cool air that has flowed upwards of the rack passes through the second rectifying member 112, so that the wind direction is adjusted. Further, in the vicinity of the corner on the cold aisle side at the upper end of the rack shown in FIG. 9, cold air is guided in a direction parallel to the intake surface by the flat panel 2 </ b> B of the second rectifying member 112. As described above, in the first embodiment, since the cool air is rectified by the first rectifying member 111 or the second rectifying member 112, formation of a hot spot is prevented.

  As described above, according to the first embodiment, hot spots can be prevented from being formed by the rectifying member, and a resistor such as a filter is not used as the rectifying member. The degree of freedom when installing can be increased.

In addition, since most of the rectifying members are constituted by vertical members, it is possible to provide an air conditioning system with less dust accumulation and high maintainability.

<Embodiment 2>
FIG. 10 is a diagram illustrating a configuration example of an air conditioning system according to the second embodiment. The second embodiment is different from the first embodiment in that the flat surface made of a non-breathable material is provided flush with the intake surface at the end of the rack row on the outlet side. Are the same. In particular, in this embodiment, a switchboard (PDU) 120 is provided at the end of the rack row on the outlet side, and the outer surface (flat surface) of the casing of the PDU 120 is arranged so as to be flush with the intake surface. In the second embodiment, a region sandwiched between planes flush with the intake surface is also a cold aisle (second region) C, and a first rectifying member 111 is provided at the outlet side end of the cold aisle C. . That is, the outer surface (plane) of the PDU 120 is located on the most outlet side of the cold aisle C. If the outer surface of the PDU 120 is not provided with an intake port or an exhaust port, or if the surface in contact with air adopts a non-breathable type, no hot spot is formed in this portion even if a drift or contraction occurs. Therefore, even when the first rectifying member 111 is a louver as in the second embodiment and the effect of suppressing the wind speed is small, there is no temperature rise near the cold air inlet, and the intake air temperature of each rack 102 is kept substantially uniform. It is.

  The effect of rectification by this rectifying member will be described with reference to FIGS. In the example of FIGS. 11 to 13, in the arrangement shown in FIG. 10, # 1 is stopped among the three air conditioning units 104, and the AA line is operated with two units # 2 and # 3. The rack suction temperature in a cross section is shown.

  FIG. 11 is a diagram illustrating a simulation result when there is no rectifying member. As shown in FIG. 11, when there is no rectifying effect by the rectifying member, a hot spot having a particularly high temperature is formed near the center of the cold aisle C, and a wide area such as an end of the cold aisle on the air conditioning unit 104 side and the upper part of the cold aisle is provided. Hot spots are formed in the area.

  FIG. 12 is a diagram illustrating a simulation result in the case of using a louver instead of the first rectifying member 111 and the second rectifying member 112. That is, this is an example in the case where there is no effect of adjusting the direction of the cold air by the first rectifying member 111 and the second rectifying member 112.

  In this case, as shown in FIG. 12, although the temperature rise near the center is somewhat improved, hot spots are formed on the cold aisle end on the air conditioning unit 104 side and on the cold aisle due to the influence of drift.

FIG. 13 shows the first rectifying member 111 and the second rectifying member 112 of the second embodiment as the rectifying members.
It is a figure which shows the simulation result at the time of using. As shown in FIG. 13, when the first rectifying member 111 and the second rectifying member 112 of the second embodiment are provided, the formation of hot spots can be suppressed as compared to other examples.

  In particular, as shown in FIG. 3, a plurality of air conditioning units 104 are provided at different positions in the horizontal direction in order to ensure redundancy, and cold air blows out from the air outlets of some of the air conditioning units 104 due to failure or the like. In such a case, the hot spot is easily formed due to the influence of the drift, but the drift is suppressed by the rectifying effect of the first rectifying member 111 and the second rectifying member 112, and the formation of the hot spot is prevented.

  As described above, according to the second embodiment, the formation of hot spots can be prevented by the rectifying member, and the light transmittance of the upper portion of the rectifying member is high, so that the degree of freedom when installing a security camera or illumination can be increased. it can.

In addition, since most of the rectifying members are constituted by vertical members, it is possible to provide an air conditioning system with less dust accumulation and high maintainability.

<Embodiment 3>
FIG. 14 is a diagram illustrating a configuration example of a flow regulating member according to the third embodiment. The third embodiment is different from the second embodiment described above in the configuration in which the second rectifying member is spanned between the racks, and the other configurations are the same.

  As shown in FIG. 14, even when the second rectifying member 112 is configured such that a slat having a surface orthogonal to the direction in which the racks 102 are arranged is stretched over the rack 102, the second rectifying member 112 flows upward. By adjusting the direction of the cool air and guiding it to the cold aisle C, formation of hot spots can be prevented.

  In addition, a sufficient rectifying effect can be obtained without providing a resistor above the rack, the light transmission is high as in the first embodiment, and the degree of freedom when installing a security camera or illumination can be increased. it can.

1A, 2A Louver 1B Resistor 2A Wing board 2B Flat panel 12 Entrance door 100 Air conditioning system 101 Data center 102 Rack 103 Server room 104 Air conditioning unit 104A Air outlet 111 First rectifying member 112 Second rectifying member C Cold aisle H Hot aisle

Claims (8)

An air conditioning system that performs air conditioning of an information processing equipment room in which racks that contain information processing equipment are arranged in a row,
An air outlet that opens toward the rack in the information processing equipment room and blows out cool air for cooling the information processing equipment into the information processing equipment room;
The rack rows are arranged side by side with the air intake surfaces of the rack rows facing each other, a region to which cool air is supplied between the air intake surfaces facing each other is defined as a cold air region, and the cold air region having a longitudinal arrangement direction of the racks A first rectifying member that is provided at a longitudinal end of the rack and has a plurality of surfaces parallel to the arrangement direction of the racks, and adjusts the flow direction and flow velocity of the cold air flowing into the cold air region;
A second portion provided at an upper portion of the cold air region , and having a plurality of surfaces perpendicular to the arrangement direction of the racks and parallel to the height direction of the rack to adjust a flow direction and a flow velocity of the cold air flowing into the cold air region; Comprising a flow regulating member,
Air conditioning system for information processing equipment room. The first rectifying member and the second rectifying member are a vertical louver having a vertical slat, a horizontal louver having a horizontal slat, a lattice louver, or a honeycomb louver.
The air conditioning system of the information processing equipment room according to claim 1. The first rectifying member is a louver having a slat parallel to the intake surface of the rack.
The air conditioning system of the information processing equipment room according to claim 1 or 2. The second rectifying member is provided from the top of the rack in one row to the top of the rack in the other row provided as a pair with the cold air region in between.
The air conditioning system of the information processing equipment room according to claim 3. The second rectifying member is provided between the top of the rack and the ceiling of the information processing equipment room,
The air conditioning system of the information processing equipment room according to claim 3. A part of the wing plate provided on the second rectifying member on the rack side includes a flat plate parallel to the intake surface of the rack.
The air conditioning system of the information processing equipment room according to claim 5. Between the first rectifying member and the rack, a flat surface made of a non-breathable material is provided flush with the intake surface of the rack.
The air conditioning system for an information processing equipment room according to any one of claims 1 to 6. A plurality of the air outlets are provided at different positions in the horizontal direction, and among the plurality of air outlets, cold air is blown out from some of the air outlets.
The air conditioning system for an information processing equipment room according to any one of claims 1 to 7.

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