Utilising Cold Energy from Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to Reduce the Electricity Cost of Data Centres
The Office of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission has reported that, from 2014 to 2018, Thailand’s internet usage has grown six-fold to 3.3 million terabytes per annum. This market trend highlights one of the policies of Thailand 4.0, with the aim of making Thailand a hub for...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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MDPI AG
2021-10-01
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| Series: | Energies |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/19/6269 |
| _version_ | 1797516577264893952 |
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| author | Maytungkorn Sermsuk Yanin Sukjai Montri Wiboonrat Kunlanan Kiatkittipong |
| author_facet | Maytungkorn Sermsuk Yanin Sukjai Montri Wiboonrat Kunlanan Kiatkittipong |
| author_sort | Maytungkorn Sermsuk |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The Office of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission has reported that, from 2014 to 2018, Thailand’s internet usage has grown six-fold to 3.3 million terabytes per annum. This market trend highlights one of the policies of Thailand 4.0, with the aim of making Thailand a hub for information transfer in ASEAN. As a result, there will be a massive demand growth for data storage facilities in the near future. Data centres are regarded as the brain and heart of the digital industry and are essential for facilitating businesses in organising, processing, storing and disseminating large amounts of data. As the energy demand for equipment cooling contributes to over 37% of the total energy consumption, the data centres of the world’s leading companies, such as Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Facebook, are generally located in cold climate zones, such as Iceland, in order to reduce operating costs for cooling. Due to this reason, the possibility of data centres in Thailand is limited. Beneficially, PTTLNG, as the first liquified natural gas (LNG) terminal in Thailand, has processed the import, receiving, storage and regasification of LNG. The high abundance of cold energy inherently presented in LNG is normally lost to the surroundings during regasification. Presently, PTTLNG’s LNG receiving terminal utilises a heat exchanger with propane as an intermediate fluid to transfer cold energy from LNG to water. This cold energy, in the form of cold water, is then used in several projects within the LNG receiving terminal: (1) production of electricity via an organic Rankine cycle capacity of 5 MWh; (2) cooling the air inlet of gas turbine generators to increase the generator efficiency; (3) replacing refrigerant heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems within buildings; (4) development of winter plantations with precision agriculture to replace imported products. Therefore, this study focuses on the potential and future use for LNG cold energy by performing a thermodynamic and economic analysis of the use of LNG cold energy as a source to produce cold water at 7 °C, with the total cold energy of 27.77 to 34.15 MW or 7934 t to 9757 t of refrigeration depending on the target pressure of the natural gas to replace the conventional cooling system of data centres. This research has the potential to reduce the cooling operation costs of data centres by more than USD 9.87 million per annum as well as CO<sub>2</sub> emissions by 34,772 t per annum. In an economic study, this research could lead to a payback period of 7 years with IRR 13% for the LNG receiving terminal and a payback period of 2.21 years with IRR 45% for digital companies. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-10T07:02:51Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-675f773983984bbc8e0f7591b686ad53 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1996-1073 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-10T07:02:51Z |
| publishDate | 2021-10-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Energies |
| spelling | doaj.art-675f773983984bbc8e0f7591b686ad532023-11-22T16:01:50ZengMDPI AGEnergies1996-10732021-10-011419626910.3390/en14196269Utilising Cold Energy from Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to Reduce the Electricity Cost of Data CentresMaytungkorn Sermsuk0Yanin Sukjai1Montri Wiboonrat2Kunlanan Kiatkittipong3Department of Chemical Engineering, School of Engineering, King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Ladkrabang, Bangkok 10520, ThailandDepartment of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi, Bangkok 10140, ThailandKMITL Business School, King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Ladkrabang, Bangkok 10520, ThailandDepartment of Chemical Engineering, School of Engineering, King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Ladkrabang, Bangkok 10520, ThailandThe Office of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission has reported that, from 2014 to 2018, Thailand’s internet usage has grown six-fold to 3.3 million terabytes per annum. This market trend highlights one of the policies of Thailand 4.0, with the aim of making Thailand a hub for information transfer in ASEAN. As a result, there will be a massive demand growth for data storage facilities in the near future. Data centres are regarded as the brain and heart of the digital industry and are essential for facilitating businesses in organising, processing, storing and disseminating large amounts of data. As the energy demand for equipment cooling contributes to over 37% of the total energy consumption, the data centres of the world’s leading companies, such as Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Facebook, are generally located in cold climate zones, such as Iceland, in order to reduce operating costs for cooling. Due to this reason, the possibility of data centres in Thailand is limited. Beneficially, PTTLNG, as the first liquified natural gas (LNG) terminal in Thailand, has processed the import, receiving, storage and regasification of LNG. The high abundance of cold energy inherently presented in LNG is normally lost to the surroundings during regasification. Presently, PTTLNG’s LNG receiving terminal utilises a heat exchanger with propane as an intermediate fluid to transfer cold energy from LNG to water. This cold energy, in the form of cold water, is then used in several projects within the LNG receiving terminal: (1) production of electricity via an organic Rankine cycle capacity of 5 MWh; (2) cooling the air inlet of gas turbine generators to increase the generator efficiency; (3) replacing refrigerant heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems within buildings; (4) development of winter plantations with precision agriculture to replace imported products. Therefore, this study focuses on the potential and future use for LNG cold energy by performing a thermodynamic and economic analysis of the use of LNG cold energy as a source to produce cold water at 7 °C, with the total cold energy of 27.77 to 34.15 MW or 7934 t to 9757 t of refrigeration depending on the target pressure of the natural gas to replace the conventional cooling system of data centres. This research has the potential to reduce the cooling operation costs of data centres by more than USD 9.87 million per annum as well as CO<sub>2</sub> emissions by 34,772 t per annum. In an economic study, this research could lead to a payback period of 7 years with IRR 13% for the LNG receiving terminal and a payback period of 2.21 years with IRR 45% for digital companies.https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/19/6269LNGcold energy utilisationintermediate fluid vaporiserdata centrefree coolingenergy efficiency |
| spellingShingle | Maytungkorn Sermsuk Yanin Sukjai Montri Wiboonrat Kunlanan Kiatkittipong Utilising Cold Energy from Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to Reduce the Electricity Cost of Data Centres Energies LNG cold energy utilisation intermediate fluid vaporiser data centre free cooling energy efficiency |
| title | Utilising Cold Energy from Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to Reduce the Electricity Cost of Data Centres |
| title_full | Utilising Cold Energy from Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to Reduce the Electricity Cost of Data Centres |
| title_fullStr | Utilising Cold Energy from Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to Reduce the Electricity Cost of Data Centres |
| title_full_unstemmed | Utilising Cold Energy from Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to Reduce the Electricity Cost of Data Centres |
| title_short | Utilising Cold Energy from Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) to Reduce the Electricity Cost of Data Centres |
| title_sort | utilising cold energy from liquefied natural gas lng to reduce the electricity cost of data centres |
| topic | LNG cold energy utilisation intermediate fluid vaporiser data centre free cooling energy efficiency |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/14/19/6269 |
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