Tag: coolant distribution unit

  • Two Degrees Decide Whether an AI Cooling Unit Is 5 MW or 3 MW — and How Many You Buy

    Two Degrees Decide Whether an AI Cooling Unit Is 5 MW or 3 MW — and How Many You Buy

    TL;DR · 30-second read

    The Short Version

    Artificial intelligence runs inside warehouse-sized buildings packed with computers that get extremely hot. Getting that heat out has become one of the hardest and costliest parts of building them.

    On September 19 in Santa Clara, California, the Italian air-conditioning maker Clivet showed a new range of cooling equipment built for those buildings, including its largest heat-removal unit yet.

    The catch is in the fine print. That unit only reaches full strength if operators let the cooling water run slightly warmer. Ask it for water two degrees colder and it carries about 40 percent less heat — so you need more machines, and more floor space to put them on.

    Clivet said in a September 19 press release that it made the global debut of its next-generation magnetic levitation compressor at AI Infra Summit 2026 in Santa Clara, California, under a “DUO POWER BOOST” theme. The compressor uses a dual-rotor, two-stage architecture in which each rotor and impeller varies speed independently to suit different flow rates and pressure ratios.

    Alongside it, the company showed a data center cooling portfolio spanning air-cooled magnetic levitation chillers, a “magnetic CDU” that merges the cooling source with liquid-cooling distribution, high-capacity coolant distribution units, fan walls and terminal units. The largest CDU on display is rated up to 3 MW at a 3K approach temperature difference or 5 MW at 5K, with predictive control holding temperature fluctuation within ±0.5°C and key components replaceable online. Clivet also staged a joint power-and-cooling coordination demonstration with CLOU, which supplied energy storage and power delivery.

    Executive Summary

    This is a product debut rather than a contract announcement: no customer, no order book, no ship date. What makes it worth reading closely is a single line in the specification. The same coolant distribution unit — the box that takes heat from the water loop running through server racks and hands it to the building’s chilled-water system — is rated at 3 MW or 5 MW depending on nothing more than how close the two water temperatures are allowed to get.

    That gap, called the approach temperature difference, is normally treated as a plumbing detail. At AI rack densities it is a capacity decision. A two-kelvin change in the specification moves roughly 2 MW of heat rejection per unit, which translates directly into how many CDUs an operator buys, how much floor space they consume and how much pipework threads the room.

    The wider signal is a European HVAC manufacturer re-pointing core product lines — chillers, compressors, air handling — at AI thermal loads, and pairing them with an energy-storage partner so that power and cooling arrive as one conversation. Clivet has disclosed an architecture and a capacity envelope. It has not disclosed efficiency ratings, availability, pricing or a single deployment.

    The Spec Sheet, Not the Steel, Sets the Megawatts

    Read the CDU rating again: up to 3 MW at 3K approach temperature difference, or 5 MW at 5K. Approach temperature is the gap between the facility water a chiller plant delivers and the warmer technology-side water that actually circulates through cold plates on the processors. A heat exchanger’s duty scales with the temperature difference driving it, so widening the approach from 3K to 5K — a factor of 1.67 — lifts the rating from 3 MW to 5 MW, also a factor of 1.67. The ratings track heat-exchanger physics almost exactly. Nothing inside the cabinet changed.

    The operational consequence is the part buyers underestimate. An operator whose chip vendor mandates cold inlet water, and who therefore specifies a tight 3K approach, is buying a 3 MW machine at the price and footprint of a 5 MW one. Sizing a 30 MW hall needs ten units instead of six, with the extra floor area, valve sets, pipe runs, commissioning hours and maintenance headcount that go with them. Conversely, an operator who can accept warmer technology-side water recovers roughly 67 percent more capacity per unit — and typically unlocks more free-cooling hours upstream, because warmer facility water lets the chiller’s compressors idle for more of the year.

    That uplift is not free, and Clivet’s release does not price it. Moving 5 MW instead of 3 MW through the same unit means proportionally more flow at a given temperature rise, which means pump power, larger secondary pipework and higher pressure drop. Flow rates, pump curves and pressure-drop figures were not published. The honest reading is that the 5 MW headline number is real but conditional, and the condition is set by the silicon vendor’s inlet temperature limit, not by the cooling vendor.

    Why Magnetic Levitation, and Why the Compressor Is the Announcement

    A magnetic levitation compressor spins its impellers on magnetic bearings rather than oil-lubricated ones. Removing oil removes a chronic efficiency tax: over time, oil migrates into heat exchangers and films the tube walls, degrading heat transfer in exactly the equipment whose job is heat transfer. Oil-free machines also tolerate frequent starts and hold efficiency well at part load — which matters because a data center chiller plant almost never runs at design load.

    Clivet’s specific claim is architectural. The DUO POWER BOOST design puts two rotors in a two-stage compression path and lets each vary speed independently, so the machine can trade flow against pressure ratio as ambient conditions and IT load move. In principle that widens the efficient operating envelope, which is the right target for a facility whose load profile swings with training runs and whose lift changes with the seasons.

    What is substantiated here is a design description. What is not substantiated is performance. The release contains no coefficient of performance, no part-load efficiency figure such as IPLV or NPLV, no capacity range for the chillers, no refrigerant, no sound data and no third-party certification. Those are the numbers a consulting engineer actually specifies against, and until they exist the compressor is an architecture rather than a comparable product.

    Selling Power and Cooling as One Problem

    The joint demonstration with CLOU — energy storage and power delivery on one side, thermal management on the other — is commercially more interesting than it looks. Clivet’s own framing is that power configuration, thermal design, space layout and maintenance planning have to be settled together in a project’s earliest stages. That is a fair description of where high-density projects slip: the electrical and mechanical designs are often procured by different teams on different schedules, and the mismatch surfaces at commissioning.

    Packaging across that boundary is a recognisable vendor strategy in this market, and it is a response to buyer behaviour rather than a technical breakthrough. Operators building AI halls increasingly want a single party accountable for the megawatt from the switchgear to the cold plate, because integration risk is what delays revenue.

    The limits should be stated plainly. What was shown was a coordinated demonstration, not a disclosed commercial arrangement. Neither company published a joint product, a reference architecture, a territory split, an exclusivity term or a customer that has bought the combination. Until one of those appears, this is a booth, not a venture.

    A European HVAC Line Re-Aimed at AI Heat

    The portfolio’s shape is the story for the wider industry. Clivet showed facility-side air-cooled chillers, a magnetic CDU that folds the cooling source and the liquid distribution loop into one machine, high-capacity CDUs for secondary-side distribution, fan walls and terminal units — coverage from outdoor heat rejection to the rack. That is a general-purpose comfort-and-process HVAC catalogue being re-cut for a single vertical, and it puts Clivet into a tier already crowded with Vertiv, Schneider Electric’s Motivair, Boyd, nVent, Munters and Modine.

    The magnetic CDU is the genuinely differentiated item in the list, because combining chiller and distribution in one enclosure removes an interface — and interfaces are where commissioning time and finger-pointing live. It also concentrates risk, which is presumably why the release stresses online replacement of key components and ±0.5°C predictive control. Tight temperature stability matters for cold-plate systems because dew point and thermal cycling both sit close to the operating envelope; a loop that overshoots risks condensation on cold plates or stress on solder joints.

    For buyers, the practical takeaway is that the competitive question in this tier is no longer whether a vendor offers liquid cooling. It is whose ratings survive the approach temperature their silicon demands, and who will put efficiency and availability numbers behind the architecture.

    Background

    Clivet is an Italian heating, ventilation and air-conditioning manufacturer based in Feltre, in the Veneto region, and has been majority-owned by China’s Midea Group since 2016. Its traditional business spans chillers, heat pumps and air-handling equipment for commercial and industrial buildings — a catalogue it is now re-aiming at data centers, where thermal design has become a primary constraint on how much computing capacity a building can hold.

    AI Infra Summit, held in Santa Clara in the heart of Silicon Valley, has become a gathering point for the supply chain behind AI buildout: chips, power, networking and increasingly cooling. The shift to direct-to-chip liquid cooling has drawn in vendors from adjacent markets — industrial refrigeration, automotive thermal, building HVAC — because a coolant distribution unit is, at bottom, a pump, a heat exchanger and a controller, all of which these companies already build at scale. What they must prove to data center buyers is uptime, serviceability and certified performance, which is why the specification sheet, not the stage demonstration, is where these launches are ultimately judged.

    Sources

    Source: DUO POWER BOOST: Clivet Debuts Next-Gen Magnetic Levitation Technology and AI Cooling Portfolio at AI Infra Summit 2026 — the company’s September 19, 2026 announcement detailing its magnetic levitation compressor architecture, CDU capacity ratings and a joint power-and-cooling demonstration with CLOU.

  • LG’s 600kW Nvidia-Certified CDU Shows Why AI Cooling Is a Vetted-Vendor Market

    LG’s 600kW Nvidia-Certified CDU Shows Why AI Cooling Is a Vetted-Vendor Market

    TL;DR · 30-second read

    The Short Version

    LG, best known for televisions and fridges, just won approval from Nvidia, the company whose chips run most artificial intelligence systems, to supply equipment that keeps those chips cool.

    One cabinet of Nvidia’s newest chips uses roughly as much electricity as a hundred homes. That makes it far too hot for fans, so liquid has to be pumped right up against the chips.

    LG is the first Korean company approved for this. The approval matters because buyers rarely risk a leak next to millions of dollars of hardware.

    Startup Fortune reported that LG Electronics’ 600kW-class coolant distribution unit (CDU) has passed Nvidia’s final quality certification. That makes LG the first Korean company approved in this category of liquid cooling equipment for Nvidia-based AI server racks. LG announced the approval in late July 2026.

    LG says it will next seek certification for 1MW, 2.5MW and 4MW CDU models. It sells the unit as part of a ‘Chip to Chiller’ package spanning server-level cold plates through building-scale chillers.

    Executive Summary

    A coolant distribution unit is the pump-and-heat-exchanger that moves liquid between a data center’s cooling plant and the cold plates mounted on GPUs and CPUs. LG’s 600kW unit is now on Nvidia’s approved list. LG says it holds coolant temperature within ±0.25°C, runs redundant pumps and power supplies, and includes virtual sensors and leak detection.

    The approval matters because of rack density. Nvidia’s DGX GB200 NVL72 system draws about 120kW per rack, roughly four times the level at which air cooling alone stops working. At that density, liquid cooling is mandatory. It also sits millimetres from very expensive silicon, so buyers screen suppliers before any price is discussed.

    For LG, the certification also serves its shift toward business customers. It gets LG into the running for Nvidia-based deployments. It does not yet deliver orders: LG has named affiliate projects and earlier regional references, but no large external cloud contract.

    At 120kW a Rack, Air Is Out of the Picture

    Data Center Engineering puts the practical limit for air handling at roughly 30kW per rack. Above that, heat removal has to move closer to the chip. Nvidia’s own DGX GB200 system guide describes the NVL72 rack at approximately 120kW, with 72 Blackwell GPUs and 36 Grace CPUs in a single rack-scale design. For operators, liquid cooling at that density is a requirement, not a design choice.

    The CDU is the working heart of that liquid loop. It takes heat from coolant returning off the chips’ cold plates and passes it to the facility’s water system, while holding flow and temperature steady. On paper, a 600kW unit covers the heat of about five 120kW racks. That is a row-level building block, not a whole-hall system.

    Why Approval Comes Before Price

    This is the mechanism behind the headline. When the equipment being cooled costs millions of dollars per rack, a coolant leak or pump failure is a business interruption plus a large hardware bill, not a routine repair. Buyers therefore lean on Nvidia’s qualification as a first screen. The approved list narrows the field before bidding starts, so a cooling vendor’s first hurdle is getting qualified, and competing on price comes after.

    LG’s stated specifications match what that screen looks for: tight temperature control (±0.25°C), redundant pumps and power so cooling continues through a component failure, and leak detection. None of this is novel on its own. Together, with Nvidia’s approval attached, it lets LG compete for business it previously could not bid on.

    The effects run in several directions. Established cooling vendors gain a large, well-capitalised new competitor. Hyperscalers, the largest cloud operators, and other data center builders gain another qualified source at a time when liquid cooling demand is rising fast. Uncertified suppliers face a clearer barrier. One certification does not prove the whole market works this way, but it shows plainly where the entry gate for Nvidia-based cooling sits.

    From 600kW to 4MW: The Roadmap Is the Real Test

    LG plans to seek certification for 1MW, 2.5MW and 4MW CDUs next. The scale jump is significant: a 4MW unit could, in principle, serve the heat of more than thirty NVL72-class racks. That is the size at which large AI campuses buy cooling. The 600kW approval gets LG into the running. The megawatt-class approvals will decide whether LG can supply those campuses.

    LG frames the opportunity with a market forecast of about 26 percent annual growth, reaching roughly $133.5 billion (about 185 trillion won) by 2034. This is LG’s own projection, and it has not published the underlying methodology. Readers should treat it as the company’s view of market size, not an independent estimate. The direction is less in doubt than the number: Nvidia’s published rack power figures already require liquid cooling at the top end.

    An Appliance Maker’s Business-Customer Arithmetic

    The certification also fits LG’s broader repositioning. At a January 7 briefing, LG said business lines including B2B, webOS and direct-to-consumer grew from about 29 percent of revenue in 2021 to 45 percent in the second half of 2025. Their share of operating profit rose from 21 percent to about 90 percent. Data center cooling draws on work LG already does: HVAC, heat transfer and precision temperature control.

    The execution risk is real. LG’s stated pipeline includes AI data centers for group affiliate LG CNS, along with earlier cooling references in North America and Indonesia. These are credible starting points. They do not show that global cloud buyers, who usually demand worldwide service coverage and proven delivery at volume, will commit to LG for large deployments.

    Background

    LG Electronics built its brand on televisions, refrigerators and washing machines. For several years it has been shifting its growth strategy toward business customers, including commercial HVAC, and this year it said those business lines generate most of its operating profit. Precision cooling for data centers is a natural extension of that heat-transfer engineering.

    Nvidia’s Blackwell-generation rack-scale systems have made liquid cooling routine at the high end of AI infrastructure. The GB200 NVL72 combines 72 GPUs and 36 CPUs in one rack drawing about 120kW, far above the roughly 30kW at which air cooling reaches its limit. That has created fast-growing demand for direct-to-chip cooling components such as cold plates and coolant distribution units. Nvidia’s supplier qualification acts as the main gate into that supply chain.

    Sources

    Source: LG Electronics wins Korea’s first Nvidia liquid cooling certification as AI data centers hit a heat wall (Startup Fortune): LG’s 600kW coolant distribution unit clears Nvidia’s quality certification.