RACA Journal I October 2026 www. refrigerationandaircon. co. za 23
DATA CENTRE FEATURE SERIES
However, the transition from predominantly air‐cooled to heavily liquid‐cooled environments is not trivial. Van Zyl described the practical difficulties of retrofitting existing halls: weaving pipework through spaces historically designed for cables and ducts, introducing new failure modes associated with leaks, and changing the skill mix required in operations. The data centre becomes as much a plumbing environment as an electrical one. The availability and reliability of local mechanical trades, and not just electricians, thus becomes a factor in site feasibility and operating risk.
Immersion cooling was treated with both interest and caution. Glenn noted that mature deployments can be robust, protect servers from corrosion and operate at higher fluid temperatures, potentially eliminating the need for conventional chilled water. Van Zyl, however, stressed the operational and spatial penalties for large‐scale, multi‐tenant use: moving from vertical racks to horizontal tanks reduces vertical density, increases floor loading and makes maintenance far more labour‐intensive. Immersion, the panel agreed, likely has a‘ sweet spot’ at extremely high densities and in more homogenous or single‐tenant environments, but is less convincing today as a universal solution for large co-locations.
The likely outcome, in Acton’ s view, is a hybrid future. Even in a heavily liquid‐cooled hall, perhaps only about 80 % of the total heat is removed via liquids. The balance comes from cables, networking equipment, busbars and other components that remain air‐cooled. Glenn suggested that we may eventually see combined approaches where the chips are cooled by direct liquid loops and the surrounding components sit in immersion tanks, particularly at extreme rack densities measured in hundreds of kilowatts. These possibilities reinforce the point that cooling strategy now influences not just mechanical plant design, but also floorplate geometry, height, structural engineering and, in turn, site selection.
POLICY, SKILLS AND AFRICA’ S OPPORTUNITY TO LEAPFROG
The panel then turned to regulatory and policy environments, where African markets can learn from, and avoid replicating, certain European missteps. Acton highlighted Europe’ s emerging energy labelling schemes for data centres, modelled on consumer appliance labels. While intended to promote efficiency, such schemes risk flattening out locational advantages and dulling incentives to place high‐density infrastructure in naturally cooler regions. For Africa, with its diverse climates and resource profiles, he argued that policy should instead reward operators for exploiting local environmental benefits.
Design philosophy provides another lever for handling uncertainty. Van Zyl described xneelo’ s shift towards modularity within a conventional shell:
instead of fully building out a 10 – 14 MW site on day one, they commission one or two data halls and populate them with standardised power and cooling pods that can be repeated or upsized over time. This allows capex to track demand more closely and mitigates the risk of stranded assets where large, high‐density builds may take longer to fill.
FROM RACKS TO PEOPLE: BUILDING THE AFRICAN TALENT PIPELINE
Acton highlighted a global shortage of commissioning engineers, especially those able to validate new cooling technologies and hybrid systems. Where independent agents once relied on simple load‐bank tests, many liquid‐cooling deployments are now commissioned by OEMs themselves, raising questions about independence, risk and customer confidence.
Within co-location, the traditional boundary of responsibility is also blurring. Operators used to deliver power and cold air to the rack and leave the rest to the tenant. Now customers arrive with their own CDUs, immersion tanks and custom liquid systems, yet often lack a full understanding of the infrastructure implications. As Acton and Van Zyl noted, when leaks or failures occur, it is increasingly difficult to define where responsibility and SLAs begin and end, and without clearer standards operators risk being drawn into bespoke, hard‐to‐scale arrangements.
Despite these challenges, the panel was cautiously optimistic about Africa’ s ability to respond. With less legacy plant than Europe or North America, many new African builds can be designed from the outset for higher floor loads, higher densities, modularity and hybrid cooling. The critical dependency is a robust talent pipeline. In response to an audience question on careers, Meyer stressed there is no single route into the sector: STEM degrees, apprenticeships, on‐the‐job learning and vocational trades are all relevant at a time when hundreds of thousands of roles worldwide remain unfilled. As he quipped, in a liquid‐cooled world a well‐trained plumber may soon be one of the most sought‐after professionals in the data centre, underscoring that skills in managing water, heat and energy will be as vital as those that design the chips themselves. RACA
At the 2026 Pan African Data Centre conference, a panel discussion unpacked the topic‘ The impact of evolving chip cooling requirements on data centre operations and design’.
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RACA Journal I October 2026 www. refrigerationandaircon. co. za 23