Nvidia Says New AI Servers Will Use Only Liquid Cooling in Closed Loop

Nvidia announced Monday that its newest AI servers will use liquid cooling exclusively. Fortune reported the system circulates a coolant made of three-quarters water and one-quarter propylene glycol in a closed loop, so it draws in no new water. Ali Heydari, Nvidia’s director of data center cooling and infrastructure, said the design has eliminated massive amounts of power usage and pretty much all water usage.

The coolant remains operational at temperatures up to 45 °C. The United Nations predicted earlier this month that AI-related water consumption could equal the annual needs of 1.3 billion people by the end of the decade. In August 2024 Microsoft announced its new data centers will stop using water for cooling and save more than 125 million liters per year per facility.

Andrew A. Chien, a University of Chicago professor who directs the CERES Center for Unstoppable Computing, said the higher temperature threshold allows heat to vent outdoors without air conditioning in many climates. The industry standard cooling temperature is 30 °C.

Nvidia estimates a 50-megawatt hyperscale facility could save over $4 million a year in cooling-related energy and water costs. The company published a blog post Monday stating full liquid-cooled infrastructure enables data centers to dramatically reduce cooling energy consumption.

Nvidia did not immediately respond to questions about system costs or whether it will retrofit existing data centers.

Chien noted that zero water use remains unrealistic but liquid cooling will cut consumption sharply.