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• Mauritius Pitches Sea-Cooled Data Centers

  September 21st, 2009 : Rich Miller
  

  An overview of sea water air conditioning (SWAC) from Makai Ocean Engineering.

  Can the island nation of Mauritius become an international data center hub? Economic development officials in the island chain in the western Indian Ocean believe that Mauritius can become a key hub connecting Africa, Asia and the Middle East. A key part of that pitch is the ocean itself, and its potential to help data center operators slash their cooling costs.

  The Mauritius Eco-Park plans to develop a system to use sea water air conditioning (SWAC) to support data center tenants. The concept taps deep water currents that bring colder water within two miles of Mauritius.

  The Eco-Park plans to build a system of pipes that will extend two miles offshore and as much as 1,000 meters (3,200 feet) beneath the ocean surface, where the water is about 40 degrees Fahrenheit (5 degrees C). The cold water will be piped back to the data center complex and used in the facility’s cooling system, eliminating the need for power-hungry chillers.

  Approach Used in Other Industries
  SWAC “hasn’t been used in the data center world thus far,” said Steve Wallage of the Broad Group, a UK consultancy focused on the data center sector. “It has some history with other kinds of facilities in places like Hawaii and Sweden.” A number of projects use cold water from large fresh water lakes for cooling, including Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., whose Lake Source Cooling project uses water from Lake Cayuga. UPDATE: The city of Toronto also has a deep lake water cooling system.   

  “Often there’s resistance to alternative power and cooling systems, but the technology is fairly mature,” said Wallage. “You tend to have a high up-front cost in the pipe work, but the long-term savings is in the 75 to 90 percent range on the cooling build.” That’s consisent with results at Cornell, which says it uses 86 percent less power than when it used chillers.  

  Vendors Focused on Mauritius’ Ambitions
  The Mauritius EcoPark is working with Makai Ocean Engineering on the sea water air conditoning project. But it’s not the only company that has taken an interest in Mauritius effort to attract data centers. Executives from APC by Schneider, Fortress International and CB Richard Ellis will speak at the Data Centre Strategies Mauritius conference on Sept. 30, which is organized by Broad Group.

  “Mauritius is ideally positioned at the crossroads of Africa, Asia and Australia and outside major earthquake ridges,” commented Philip Low, managing director at BroadGroup. “The island is also well known as a major financial and infocom hub. Being relatively remote but well-connected to the world is a major attribute for the island-nation to position itself as a disaster recovery and business continuity destination.”

  Cable May Help Connectivity
  Wallage said connectivity in Mauritius, which has been an issue in the past, has been significantly improved by the construction of new undersea cables. Power prices run in the neiughborhood of 10 cents per kilowatt hour – one reason why the power reduction from the sea water air conditioning plan looms large in the island’s development plans.

  Mauritius isn’t the first island nation to try and build a reputation as a data center hub. Iceland has been marketing itself as a data center destination, touting its abundant supply of geothermal energy. Those prospects have been complicated by the country’s banking crisis last fall.

  RELATED STORIES:

  • Google Gets Patent for Data Center Barges
  • How Google’s Ocean Power Would Work
  • Scottish Server Farms Team on Tidal Power
  • Iceland’s Data Center Ambitions Are Stalled

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William Russell

Posted September 22nd, 2009

I would be very leery of a site subject to tsunamis and hurricanes, barely above sea level. Are they kidding?

Nick Aster

Posted September 23rd, 2009

Wouldn’t this make a lot more sense where the water is cooler, and the climate is not tropical? Like… I dunno, lake Michigan? Not to mention being a lot closer to population centers and data users…

Isabelle

Posted October 18th, 2009

Fact : For this “”ecologic” air condition system, SWAC is taking sea water around 400-600 meters deep to get 4°water and reject this water in the ocean at 20-24 degres around the 50 meters … at the opposite of Toronto air cooling which does not reject the water. This is not the same.
What will happen if you take cold water and put back warm water? For me this is logicaly increasing the overall temp of our ocean no ? Problem is not to use it only in one place …look where are they going to implement it and i believe you will be as worried as me concerning the effect it will make to OUR ecosystem. Did they think about methane hydrates which are so reactiv on small temperature increase? Are we again thinking short term and forgetting we do have children and as far as I know this is the only planet we’ll give them for tomorrow ?????? They are decided to empty the oceans from the deep sea cold water to use for everything, from drinking to cosmetic, do we have something to say? where are the ecological impact research ? Anybody can give me a clue of what is happening here? Isabelle

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