Japan Data Center Update 21: The Tech Race – Fuji Electric’s 85% Power-Saving Cooling Unit

Fuji Electric’s Ejector Cooling Unit Cuts Cooling Power by up to 85%

Fuji Electric announced that it has developed the world’s first ejector cooling unit, which can reduce electricity consumption for cooling data center servers by up to 85%, and will launch the product in late June. The ejector cooling unit does not use a compressor. Instead, it reuses waste heat from servers as energy and compresses and circulates refrigerant gas through Fuji Electric’s proprietary fluid compressor(ejector). By replacing conventional chillers with the unit, data center operators can expect significant energy savings.

Fuji Electric has also begun collaborating with Mitsui Knowledge Industry in the field of data center energy management. The companies aim to provide a cooling efficiency optimization service that combines Fuji Electric’s new ejector cooling unit with Mitsui Knowledge Industry’s air-conditioning control and simulation technologies, as well as its private AI platform. In data centers, server cooling accounts for 30% to 40% of electricity consumption, making its reduction a key issue for data center operators.

KDDI Cuts Cooling Power by 60% at Osaka Sakai Data Center

KDDI’s Osaka-Sakai data center, with cooling water pipes running throughout the facility (Source: Nikkei GX).

KDDI had switched all electricity used at its data centers in Japan and overseas to renewable energy by March. Advanced energy-saving technologies, such as directly cooling graphics processing unit (GPU) servers with water, played a key role in achieving the target ahead of schedule. As GPUs become more powerful, heat generation per server rack is increasing further. Since last year, KDDI has built a framework to study high-efficiency power supply equipment and water-based cooling technologies, and has been demonstrating various energy-saving technologies.

KDDI’s data center in Sakai City, Osaka, began operations in January this year. The facility uses Nvidia’s GB200 GPUs, with each server rack consuming a large amount of electricity at 130 kW. The data center has adopted direct water-cooling technology for GPU servers developed through previous demonstrations, reducing the electricity required for cooling by about 60% compared with conventional air-cooling methods. KDDI plans to open new data centers in Tama City, Tokyo, and London around 2027.

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