Google announces £471 million data centre in the Netherlands
Wed 24 Sep 2014
It’s a more-than-lively week for new data centre announcements. In the wake of Twitter’s reported Atlanta data centre investment and Microsoft’s Korean announcement, Google is the latest major presence to unveil an ambitious dc project.
The Mountain View giant’s new centre will be located at the seaport of Eemshaven in the Groningen region of the Netherlands. The 44-hectare 120 megawatts facility will cost €600mn (£471mn) over a four year period and will benefit from both natural cooling, due to the location, and greywater cooling. Construction will begin on the facility in 2016, estimated to conclude by end of 2017.
There is great interest in data centre and infrastructure development in the region, partially due to the Dutch government’s lobbying for new IT investment, but also because of the country’s significance as the end-point of a high speed fibre-optic cable running into Europe from the U.S. at Amsterdam. Microsoft is currently working on a new 17.5 megawatt data centre in Agriport A7 in Middenmeer, Noord-Holland, whilst Apple is reported to be developing another data centre in the area.
Google has similarly-arrayed data centres in Ireland, Finland and Belgium, and is said to be deepening its interest in further projects in the Netherlands. The region currently boasts 81 major data centres, nearly half of which are located at the cable landing point at Amsterdam.
Google’s Europe Blog announced the new project, promising over 1000 new jobs for the region during construction, and a predictably more modest 150 after completion. The company’s existing rented data centre at Eemshaven will remain in operation.
“Since our investment in our first European datacenter back in 2007,” the announcement states. “we have been on the lookout for supportive communities with the necessary resources to support large data centers. The required ingredients are land, workforce, networking, a choice of power and other utilities including renewable energy supplies…Eemshaven enjoys a direct cable connection to two major European Internet hubs, London and Amsterdam. In the Eemshaven, we’ve found a great community in a great location that meets the needs to become a backbone for the expanding Internet.”
