Rack power requirements have jumped from under 10 kW to as much as 150 kW in just a few years, driven by AI and HPC workloads. Chris Osian, Product Manager at Starline, a brand of

Legrand, explains how operators can build flexibility into their power distribution, why plug-in space is now at a premium and why

800-volt DC could be the next big shift.

As rack densities continue to increase, particularly with AI and HPC workloads, how are power distribution requirements changing for modern data centers?

Around five years ago, we weren’ t seeing rack power requirements exceeding 10 kW. Over the years, they’ ve evolved to around 22 kW and then 50 kW. Today, we’ re deploying racks requiring 100 to 150 kW.

That represents an order-of-magnitude increase over roughly five years. Before that, the pace of growth in power requirements and rack density was much slower.

This change has been driven by the evolution of GPUs and the way they are transforming modern data centers.

We now have IT equipment at the end of the power chain that requires increased power compared to five years ago. As a result, all the infrastructure upstream, from the busway and power distribution units( PDUs) to the connection with the utility, must accommodate these requirements.

We’ re seeing a dramatic change in the power distribution chain, which must now deliver significantly more power per rack, per row and across the entire white space.

As operators plan for higher power demands, what are some of the key factors or trade-offs they need to consider when selecting a power distribution system?

Before this rapid evolution of GPUs, power requirements were growing relatively slowly, which meant operators could choose fairly static systems.

You could develop your design and expect it to remain valid for the next 18 – 36 months, which is a typical data center project cycle. What we’ re seeing today is that GPU iterations are happening much faster, creating considerable design uncertainty.

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