Microsoft tests underwater data centre at EMEC

US software giant Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) has deployed an underwater data centre powered by renewables at the European Marine Energy Centre (EMEC) in Orkney, Scotland, the parties said last week.

The installation of the 450-kW data centre marks the start of Phase 2 of Microsoft's Project Natick, which seeks to develop self-sufficient underwater data centres that can provide fast cloud services to coastal cities.

The container-size prototype, which is as powerful as several thousand high-end consumer PCs, was installed on June 1. Installation was led by Naval Group and performed by local marine contractor Green Marine.

EMEC explained that deepwater deployment offers access to cooling, a controlled environment and could be powered by co-located renewables, such as the wave and tidal energy technologies probed at its test sites.

The data centre is expected to remain at EMEC for around one year and potentially up to five years.

"Deploying at EMEC in the Orkney Islands, on a grid powered from locally-sourced renewable energy, matches our aspirations as a project and our commitment as a company to environmental sustainability," said Ben Cutler, Project Natick manager at Microsoft Research.

The software group describes the project as out-of-the-box idea to meet rapidly growing demand for cloud computing infrastructure near population centres.

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