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The Data Center Rundown

Feb 11, 2026

 
Government policy on power costs

The Trump administration is attempting to mitigate community pushback regarding data center energy use while offering hyperscalers exemptions from potential chip tariffs to facilitate their acquisition of graphics processing units and accelerators.

Read at The Register→

Reports indicate that Donald Trump is considering a tariff exemption structure for hyperscalers with investments in Taiwanese chip manufacturing, allowing them to pass tariff relief to their United States-based customers importing chips.

Read at Data Center Dynamics→

A California state senator has introduced legislation to establish a distinct electricity rate classification specifically for large data centers exceeding 75 megawatts in capacity.

Read at Data Center Dynamics→

 

Do you support creating a unique, potentially higher electricity rate class just for California's largest data centers?

 
Optimizing AI data center design

Guidance is provided detailing how hyperscale data center operators can effectively design and deploy 100-megawatt artificial intelligence infrastructure at scale.

Read at Data Center Dynamics→

The excessive practice of oversizing data center designs is leading to significant financial waste, and industry stakeholders must adopt strategies to mitigate this costly trend.

Read at Data Center Dynamics→

 

Distributed datacenter specs

The Open Compute Project is seeking to establish specifications for distributed data centers by incorporating the all-optical Innovative Optical and Wireless Network stack to enable performance necessary for modern artificial intelligence workloads.

Read at The Register→

 

Liquid Cooling Market

The global market for data center liquid cooling solutions is projected to exceed a valuation of $27.1 billion by the year 2035.

Read at Data Center POST→

More coverage at Data Center POST →

 
Carbon-free power for AI

Energy specialists are evaluating the preparedness of nuclear power to satisfy the increasing electricity demands of artificial intelligence data centers, concluding that its viability hinges upon the success of novel deployment projects.

Read at Data Center Knowledge→

 

Can small-scale nuclear power realistically meet the energy demands of a single AI data center soon?

Innovative applications of geothermal technology are providing a scalable, clean, and dependable energy source, presenting data centers with a sustainable pathway to address their escalating power requirements.

Read at Data Center Knowledge→

 

Server Cooling Turning Point

The year 2026 is projected to be a significant inflection point for server cooling technologies, requiring enterprises to understand and prepare for necessary shifts in their data center thermal management strategies.

Read at Data Center POST→

 
Chatter
The view from Reddit
“How I nuked the network at a small gaming facility with one line.”

A junior technician recounts the harrowing experience of accidentally erasing a crucial VLAN via a simple command on a Cisco switch, only to discover the entire site network was dependent on a poorly configured VTP environment left by prior consultants.

Read at r/sysadmin→

“My AWS L4 Data Center Technician Loop Interview Experience (Just got an offer)”

A candidate details their four-loop AWS interview process, sharing specific hardware and networking technical questions encountered, while questioning the financial trade-off of accepting an L3 offer instead of the L4 position they interviewed for.

Read at r/datacenter→

“Thoughts on "Fail-to-Safe" logic for autonomous cooling?”

A developer building middleware for thermal optimization is seeking peer review on the safety architecture for active setpoint adjustments on CRAC units, questioning if a marginal PUE gain justifies the risk of autonomous control failure.

Read at r/datacenter→

 

Should autonomous cooling systems default to OEM settings upon communication failure, sacrificing efficiency?

 

AI advertising competition

As OpenAI navigates integrating advertising into its artificial intelligence offerings while balancing credibility, Google is accelerating the use of artificial intelligence to enhance its established advertising products.

Read at The Register→

 

Liquid cooling M&A

The intense heat generated by graphics processing units is driving significant mergers and acquisitions activity within the data center cooling sector, exemplified by Trane's acquisition of LiquidStack.

Read at The Register→

More coverage at Data Center Dynamics →

 

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