06/01/2026
This is the future we imagine. Happening now.
Engineers have 3D printed pure copper cooling plates that could massively cut the energy needed to cool data centers.
The breakthrough comes from researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
They developed special copper cold plates designed to pull heat away from computer chips more efficiently.
That matters because data centers use huge amounts of electricity, and a major chunk of that power goes into keeping servers cool.
The team says their design could reduce cooling energy from around 30% of a data center’s total power use to about 1.1%.
That is why people are calling it a potential 98% reduction in cooling energy.
The plates are made from pure copper, one of the best materials for conducting heat.
But the real breakthrough is the 3D printing method, which allows complex internal shapes that traditional manufacturing cannot easily create.
Those tiny internal structures help liquid cooling move heat away faster and more efficiently.
As AI grows, data centers are becoming bigger, hotter, and more power-hungry.
So a small copper plate could become a huge deal.
Less wasted energy.
Cooler chips.
And a future where data centers do not need nearly as much power just to stop themselves from overheating.
