MODERATOR - Sustainable innovation in data centers

On June 18^th e 19^th, the partners of the MODERATOR project (EU Horizon Europe) convened in Ioannina, Greece, for the month 18 progress meeting, hosted by ELECTRA. This gathering marked a key moment to assess the progress achieved and align on the next steps toward the project's ambitious objectives.

MODERATOR aims to revolutionize data center energy efficiency through the development of an integrated system that combines immersion cooling with advance thermal energy storage and utilization technologies.

The system under development includes several key innovations:

- A novel 40 kW immersion cooling system designed to recover waste heat efficiently from data centers;

- A 500 kWh low-temperature thermal energy storage (TES) unit based on phase change materials (PCMs), featuring multilayer insulation made from recycled glass granules and microparticles to reduce thermal losses;

- A fully automated prototype integrating these components for direct heat utilization and long-term storage;

HYSYTECH, serving as the project's designer for the Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) subsystem and TRL 8 system integrator, presented progress on the ORC implementation and the overall system integration strategy.

The team also shared the latest developments in the Energy Management System (EMS) architecture and control strategy, which will orchestrate the coordinated operation of all system components.

As MODERATOR advances toward its demonstration phase, the consortium continues to harness its multidisciplinary expertise -ranging from materials science and process engineering to simulation and system design- to deliver a fully operational, integrated prototype.

During the visit in Ioannina, the consortium had the opportunity to visit a photovoltaic park belonging to a local energy community, founded with the support of ELECTRA.