There are 8 million data centers around the world that are operating to serve us in an online world with speeds of 1000x every single second. Where Microsoft is taking steps to re-design the entire data center it is located for an upcoming modern world to improve all our cloud-based services. While everyone around the globe shifted online because of COVID-19 relayed on the Internet.
Where the service provider requires a best-in-class data center with the most energy and time-effective data center to deliver a powerful service experience. Where Microsoft reached the end of two years of Stage 2 experiment with syncing the data on the surface of the seas. So, today, all things to know about this and why this is the biggest news to consider, let’s check this out.
July 9th, 2020
Where are Microsoft’s data centers located?
Starting with the data: On July 9th, 2020, Microsoft reeled up what it called its Northern Isles, with a 12.2-foot-long steel structure placed 117 feet down from the surface of the ocean, for which this project was named NATICK. Two years later, it was analyzed by an engineer to study everything. Therefore, Microsoft chose a location for this experiment in the range of 10 miles off the coast of Scotland in the Orkney Islands. At this place, 100% of the energy is renewable.
The problem and the solution
The real problem with the current data center is maintenance, which includes corrosion of the data center and temperature fluctuations. Additionally, these data servers used to process a lot of data at the same time, so they required a constant cooling system. On the other hand, using a tight cooling container can potentially help alleviate some of these concerns, and reducing energy helps us maintain the environment. According to reports, 1/5 of the data center’s energy requirements are to keep the data center cool.
Why did Microsoft put a data center underwater?
Throughout, with the help of a tightly sealed container below the surface of the ocean, it helps to reduce maintenance and save energy required to cool the data center because the sea does this for free. This research practice provides some potential data and is also more secure than a land-based data center. It is more difficult because, compared to the traditional data center with trained security guards, it was a lot easier to reach the data center than reach the bottom of the sea.
Why do companies use data centers?
50% of the world population lives nearly 120 miles from the case, likely a 2-hour drive-throw. Comparing the traditional data center located a lot far away from the cities means it is faster to reach the data for you. This means a lot faster, and better, and other experts say more in terms of energy and stability for users by distributing data centers according to their needs to their nearest.
Right time, right place
These will be powered by WindMills utilizing wind energy near the coast, along with fiber optic cables used to connect and transfer data from the center with a power line for backup. This needs to be a multi-national effort; hence, the tube was made by the French ship-manufacturing Naval, and then the European Marine laid it out before it was dipped into the sea on June 8th, 2019.
Why do data centers need water?
These all resulted in a lot of negotiation and communication; afterward, we needed to wait for the calm water to perform, and it was not easy for the North Sea. Under the hood, Microsoft Data-Tube includes 864 Services with a combination of 27.6 PB, which is 27.6 million GB of data equivalent to 100,000 MacBooks.
Microsoft ThinkWeek 2014
An annual event at Microsoft where employees share their ideas about advanced ideas. After 2 years, when the data tube was taken out, it was covered with algae barnacles and sea anemones. After a quick pressurized water wash, it got clean quickly, and after the analytics, they found this 8x more reliable than traditional data centers. Some experts believe that the stored nitrogen helped them achieve extraordinary success, and they could survive for a full decade.
The Microsoft team was still busy researching and finding everything they could get from these experiments. Cloud expert Paul Johnston estimated that only 2% of the carbon footprint comes from the data center. In contrast, it was nearly going to take 0.1% of the ocean.
Effect on the sea temperature
The ocean is naturally calm, and it was going to quickly disseminate the heat from the data center, and the effect is negligible even with an advanced measuring tool. So, it takes some time to know more and wait for the next press release about it.
Let us know what you think about this in the comment section below. Stay tuned for more updates on the same in the future.