China is experimenting with constructing an undersea data center, attempting to cut cooling costs significantly. According to Reuters, the design has been finalized and a location selected off the coast of Hainan province.
The project is a collaboration between the local Hainan government, maritime tech company Highlander, and ISP Beijing Sinnet. The underwater data center will be much smaller than those on land, housing 100 data cabinets with approximately 4,200 servers, compared to the usual 50,000 – 80,000 servers. It is unclear how the project is being funded, reported Reuters.
According to Yang Zhiyong, an analyst at state-backed IT consultancy CCID Consulting, the project will take at least five years to go online. “Although power expenses might be lower than land-based data centers, the one-off investment at the beginning could be massive,” he said.
Reuters reported that the initiative is reminiscent of Microsoft’s 2018 Project Natick, which included a data center of 12 racks of servers (864 total), lowered into the sea off the coast of Scotland. Two years later, Microsoft retrieved the data center and considered it a success after only eight servers failed; it proved to be an efficient and cost-effective way to keep the servers cool.
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