Hot-Cold Aisle Containment

Hot-cold aisle containment is the practice of sealing a data center's hot aisle and/or cold aisle to better control airflow and prevent the mixing of hot and cold air. Such mixing wastes cooling energy.        

Both hot and cold air containment can significantly improve the efficiency of data center cooling systems. While both approaches eliminate the mixing of hot and cold air, there are practical differences in implementation that have significant consequences.

Data center hot-aisle cold aisle containment can better control where hot and cold air goes so that a data center's cooling system runs more efficiently. But there are several considerations, and various questions that data center managers should ask themselves:

  * Is containment right for my data centre?

  * Which solution suits my data centre hot aisle or cold aisle?

  * What else do I need to do before I install a containment solution?

  * Are there other issues that may arise from a containment solution?

  * How do I measure whether containment has actually worked for my data centre?