Data centres rely on stable cooling performance to protect critical infrastructure. But cooling towers and condenser water loops can be exposed to microbiological risks, including Legionella, biofilm formation, corrosion and loss of treatment control.
Traditional lab testing provides important compliance data, but results often arrive too late to show what is happening in the system right now. Short-term microbial shifts can occur between sampling points, leaving operators without the visibility they need to act early.
BactoSense helps data centre operators move from delayed microbiological checks to continuous online monitoring, providing near real-time cell count data directly from the cooling circuit.
Benefits for data centre cooling operations
BactoSense automatically samples from the cooling circuit and provides regular microbial cell count data. This helps operators establish a clear baseline, detect deviations and verify whether corrective actions have brought the system back under control.
Alerts can be sent directly to building management or SCADA systems for faster visibility and response.
Protected uptime
Detect microbial deviations earlier, before they can contribute to cooling performance issues or emergency interventions.
Reduced health and compliance risk
React faster to potential loss of microbial control and reduce exposure windows
Optimized biocide dosing
Verify treatment performance with continuous microbiological data instead of relying only on delayed lab results.
Lower operating cost
Reduce unnecessary troubleshooting, emergency remediation, biofouling-related issues and inefficient chemical use.
Application
Cooling system microbiology in a hyperscale data centre
In a hyperscale data centre application, BactoSense CORE was used to monitor microbiological conditions across cooling circuits. During monitoring, the data showed two threshold exceedances where microbial control was lost.
Events like these can easily be missed by monthly sampling. Online microbiological monitoring helps close this visibility gap by enabling earlier detection, faster intervention and more confident treatment decisions.