In 2025, rapid advancements in chip technology are driving the development of denser, more power-intensive computing systems. While these innovations unlock new possibilities, they also push data centers to the edge of their thermal and infrastructural limits, demanding smarter, more adaptive, and integrated approaches to cooling, energy efficiency, and environmental control.

With more than a decade of performance engineering excellence under its belt, Trane has long been a global leader in heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) and chiller solutions, shaping a more sustainable future. Guided by its ethos, “Innovating like the planet depends on it,” Trane is relentlessly focused on what’s next. The company continues to expand and evolve its capabilities, solutions, and services to enable more sustainable mission-critical environments as well.

As Danielle Rossi, global director for data centers at Trane, explains, “Chip innovation has led to much denser design, so water is permeating more than it was before” – a challenge that Trane engineers are equipped to meet with their deep technical expertise and advanced integrated solutions.

The evolution of cooling

In the mid-2000s, the idea of introducing water into data centers was met with hesitation and even skepticism. Fast forward to today, not only is water becoming a standard presence, it’s also being delivered directly to the chip.

The landscape of liquid cooling has evolved rapidly, expanding beyond water to include more advanced options like dielectric fluids, as Rossi recalls:

“From direct-to-chip to immersion cooling, whether it be single-phase or two-phase, the transition isn’t as simple as swapping air for liquid; it requires a complete rethinking of infrastructure, including how fluid is communicated from rooftop systems down to the racks.”

Key factors such as flow temperature, velocity, and system redundancy, to name a few, are critical to achieving safe and efficient operations. Recognizing the complexity of these challenges, Trane entered the liquid cooling space with the launch of its cooling distribution unit (CDU) offering this year. Encompassing a holistic system design, Rossi emphasizes that the interplay of all components is accounted for to deliver a fully integrated, future-ready system:

“We hold the market share for a lot of the world in water-cooled chillers, and that speaks for itself.”

Trust built on experience

In a mission-critical sector like data centers, particularly in today’s rapidly evolving landscape, trust is not just a value; it’s a necessity. For clients navigating increasingly complex infrastructure demands, the question becomes: why place that trust in Trane? For Rossi, the answer lies in the company’s people:

“We’ve done this for so long, but more importantly, we’ve seen it before,” she says, pointing to the deep well of engineering expertise that underpins every client engagement.

At Trane, every sales representative is a trained engineer, backed by a vast network of specialists with decades of hands-on experience.

“The range of tenures at Trane extends well beyond the 10-year mark (which in itself is highly respectable), with many employees serving for over 30, and even 40, years,” Rossi adds.

This level of continuity not only allows Trane to meet clients where they are today, it empowers them to anticipate and innovate for where those clients need to be tomorrow.

Designing beyond the product

When working with hyperscale and colocation clients, Trane approaches cooling with a wide lens, not as a standalone solution, but as part of a finely tuned, interconnected system that results in efficiency and operational intelligence. With such large-scale, high-stakes infrastructure, the focus shifts from individual components to the optimized performance of the entire ecosystem, as Rossi explains:

“You’re talking about the efficiency of the whole system and optimizing controls, etc, so pre-planned design and real-time operational adjustments need to be made to get the best design for each location – it’s not copy and paste.”

This holistic mindset enables Trane to strive toward deployments tailored to the specific needs of customers and the unique demands of their environment, enabling peak performance, adaptability, and long-term value.

The people behind the performance

While data centers are often viewed through the lens of machinery and infrastructure, Trane brings a distinctly human perspective to the conversation, placing people at the heart of its tenured legacy. Rossi highlights this human-centric approach:

“We have dedicated data center teams for control engineering and to optimize the data center space. We are actively trying to create and adjust processes and products to be able to assist and support better designs.”

That dedication is backed by one of the largest service footprints in the industry – over 2,400 technicians across North America and more than 6,000 worldwide.

For customers, this translates to faster support, more flexibility, and a consistent assurance of uptime. Much of this expertise comes from Trane’s long-standing Graduate Training Program (GTP), which equips university engineering graduates with in-depth knowledge of HVAC and thermal management systems. As Rossi shares:

“Some individuals who received that training as far back as the 1970s have gone on to teach it themselves, leveraging their years of experience.”

It’s a powerful reminder that while technologies evolve, it’s the people behind them who make the difference.

Big thinking in product development

According to Rossi, product innovation at Trane isn’t simply driven by what the company wants to sell, but guided by what the industry truly needs. Right now, that need is clear – capacity:

“We’ve been working with customers to collaboratively design products that are larger and hotter – it’s that go big or go home mentality,” says Rossi.

In response, Trane introduced its CDU in 2025, joining an already expansive suite of advanced cooling technologies, including fan walls, screw compressors, air-cooled centrifugal systems, and large-scale water-cooled solutions.

But the innovation doesn’t stop there. In March, Trane announced the development of enhanced air-cooled chillers designed for high-capacity, high-ambient temperature environments, including its Magnetic Bearing and Ascend chillers.

“The industry has been asking to make the most of their footprint and entire capacity of their site, so we’re making larger units to align with what customers need,” Rossi explains.

With nearly 900 tons of cooling capacity, the Magnetic Bearing platform is sizable, but smart. Instead of using multiple smaller chillers, one larger unit reduces total footprint and clearance requirements, proving that sometimes, bigger really is better – when it’s backed by precision engineering.

Collaboration on the factory floor

Behind every Trane solution is a deeply collaborative process that combines technical precision with customer insight. As Rossi describes, once a client aligns with their dedicated account manager on the size and type of unit needed, the journey begins with what Trane calls a “design day.” This is a hands-on, exploratory session where customers work directly with Trane engineers to define the optimal system for their needs. From footprint considerations to performance specs, the team collaborates closely before developing a prototype:

“We show them in the lab and work with them while they poke and prod to determine what they want to change or keep the same. During the second prototype phase, we’ll have more people come in to test it out and come up with a final revision.”

Acting as the quarterback, the account manager orchestrates the entire process, coordinating with design, engineering, and controls teams to ensure seamless execution.

But Trane’s process goes beyond technical checklists – according to Rossi, their approach is rooted in situational optimization, taking into account the unique variables that define each location:

“For example, if you’re using an air-cooled chiller, its efficiency is highly dependent on the temperature, so we adjust for that for each particular site – the optimization of a chiller in London is going to be very different from that in Arizona.”

This geographic consideration has become increasingly vital as customers seek new build sites in regions with available power – often in areas like Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, where high humidity and winds can come into play. Yet, even in unfamiliar territory, Trane’s depth of experience remains a guiding force:

“Even if a specific global account manager has never built in that area, I can almost guarantee we have an office of people designing in the region.”

Cooling’s high-speed service

The pace of change in data center cooling is accelerating, and the future is arriving faster than many expected. Just a few years ago, the idea of introducing liquid into the data center was still a conceptual leap. Today, it’s rapidly becoming the standard.

“I’m watching customers adjust their designs in real-time,” says Rossi. “Last year, we were in the center of people adjusting their designs while their buildings were being built. Now, people are just trying to get their ducks in a row and determine what they’re going to be using for the next 10 years – there’s a future planning element for these fast-growing chips that is making people cautious in their designs.”

As infrastructure evolves to meet next-generation demands, so too must the strategies that support it. Trane is not only helping clients keep pace, but helping them plan ahead, engineer smarter, and build with resilience.

For more information on Trane’s capabilities, offerings, and services for mission-critical environments, visit Data Center Cooling, Data Center Design | Trane Commercial HVAC.