Part 2: Designing next-generation data centres - Principals for efficiency and resilience
Beca · Akshat Malhotra, Alex Grant et al.
Beca's second article covering energy, cooling, water, resilience and decarbonisation, from raising cold-aisle temperatures to seismic restraint and AI loads.
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Overview
This 2026 Beca article (authors Akshat Malhotra, Alex Grant and Stuart Ritchie) is the second part of its next-generation data centre series and covers energy, cooling, water, resilience and decarbonisation. A PUE of about 1.4 is described as a common target; going lower needs more than conventional air cooling.
On energy and cooling, it explains that running cold aisles near 30 C lowers cooling energy and widens free-cooling hours, which Beca uses in southern Australia and New Zealand. On water, it notes that adiabatic cooling is water-intensive while dry cooling uses more energy, and the choice is made through site-specific water risk assessment.
Resilience is not seen as limited to UPS redundancy. Seismic restraint of heavy switchgear and cooling loops is a key measure in New Zealand and Indonesia, with non-structural MEP named as the main risk. Load-flow and fault-level studies support grid connection reliability. The article also covers embodied carbon tracking, heat recovery, on-site solar and BESS, and the extra power density of AI servers, which draw three to five times the power of traditional servers. Values rest on Beca's regional experience and should not be transferred directly to different climates or seismic conditions. The related document is ASHRAE's Thermal Guidelines for Data Processing Environments.
Key points
- A PUE of about 1.4 is described as a common target; going lower needs more than conventional air cooling.
- Running cold aisles near 30 C lowers cooling energy and widens free-cooling hours (used by Beca in southern Australia and NZ).
- Adiabatic cooling is water-intensive while dry cooling uses more energy; Beca uses site-specific water risk assessment to choose.
- Seismic restraint of heavy switchgear and cooling loops is a key resilience measure in NZ and Indonesia; non-structural MEP is the main risk.
- Load-flow and fault-level studies support grid connection reliability.
- AI servers draw three to five times the power of traditional servers.
- The article also covers embodied carbon tracking, heat recovery, on-site solar and BESS.
Using it in design
- Let users set the cold-aisle supply temperature and recompute free-cooling hours from the site weather file.
- Add seismic restraint requirements to heavy MEP items when the site seismic zone is high.
- Include fault-level and load-flow studies as a design checklist item.
- Make site-specific water risk assessment a required input when choosing between adiabatic and dry cooling.
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Who should read it
Data centre designers and consultants weighing efficiency, water and resilience decisions together.
Related standards
- ASHRAE Thermal Guidelines for Data Processing Environments
Publication details
- Authors
- Akshat Malhotra; Alex Grant; Stuart Ritchie
- Publisher
- Beca
- Year
- 2026
- Document language
- English
- Source type
- Expert / community
- Access
- Free to read
- Licence
- Copyright retained; citation only — the publisher’s terms apply to the original document
Citation
Akshat Malhotra; Alex Grant; Stuart Ritchie (2026). Part 2: Designing next-generation data centres - Principals for efficiency and resilience. Beca. https://www.beca.com/ignite-your-thinking/ignite-your-thinking/june-2026/part-2-designing-next-generation-data-centres-principals-for-efficiency-and-resilience
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