In-take system and method of subsidizing cost of providing information
The inventive subject matter provides for repurposing otherwise wasted thermal energy to drive a commercial process. Thermal energy from a two-phase immersion-cooling system containing a computer system is operably coupled with a compressor, heat exchanger, pressure regulator, and controller, to provide thermal energy at an elevated temperature to drive the commercial process. The immersion-cooling system can advantageously be used to cool computer systems, including Bitcoin miners, crypto miners, high-performance computers, AI computers, or other thermal energy producing devices. The system operates by extracting vapor of the working fluid residing in the headspace of the immersion-cooling system, increasing the pressure and temperature of the extracted vapor by compression, and then passing this vapor to a heat exchanger, thereby providing thermal energy to drive a commercial process. The pressure of the working fluid is reduced, and returned to the tank of the immersion-cooling system.
1 . A method of subsidizing a cost of providing information, comprising:
providing an immersion-cooling system having a tank containing a computer system immersed in a first low-pressure liquid-phase of a working fluid, the tank having a headspace containing a low-pressure vapor-phase of the working fluid and a non-condensable gas, and the computer system providing the information;
directing the low-pressure vapor-phase of the working fluid from the headspace to a compressor;
compressing the low-pressure vapor-phase of the working fluid to produce a high-pressure vapor-phase of the working fluid at an elevated temperature above a temperature of the working fluid in the tank;
utilizing the high-pressure vapor-phase of the working fluid in a heat exchanger to operate a commercial process, during which the high-pressure vapor-phase of the working fluid is condensed to a high-pressure liquid-phase of the working fluid;
reducing a pressure of the high-pressure liquid-phase of the working fluid to produce a second low-pressure liquid-phase of the working fluid;
returning the second low-pressure liquid-phase of the working fluid to the tank, where the second low-pressure liquid-phase of the working fluid is mixed with the first low-pressure liquid-phase of the working fluid in the tank; and
monitoring and controlling the commercial process;
wherein the commercial process comprises sensible heating of water to a temperature above the temperature of the working fluid in the tank.
2 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the working fluid comprises a mixture of at least two different working fluids, wherein each component of the mixture has at least two different saturation temperatures within the tank.
3 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the working fluid has a saturation temperature in the immersion-cooling system of 50° C. to 80° C., inclusive.
4 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the commercial process comprises district heating.
5 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the information comprises a Bitcoin hash.
6 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the information comprises an artificial intelligence (AI) computation.
7 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising introducing a non-condensable gas other than ambient air into the headspace.
8 . The method of claim 7 , wherein the non-condensable gas contains no more than 2 mol % of oxygen.
9 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising monitoring and controlling at least three of the computer system, the tank, operation of the bellows, the compressor, the pressure regulator, and the commercial process.
10 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising using feedback to control a rate of electrical energy usage by the computer system as a function of electrical energy cost and/or computational incentives.
11 . The method of claim 1 , further comprising disposing the compressor inside the tank.
12 . The method of claim 1 , wherein the first low-pressure liquid-phase of the working fluid and the second low-pressure liquid-phase of the working fluid have substantially the same values of pressure.