Searching The Planet To Find Power For The Cloud
April 22, 2014
Grazed from NPR. Author: Steve Henn.
You hear the term "the cloud" or "cloud computing," and you picture something puffy, white, clean and quiet. Cloud computing is anything but. Even from a distance you can hear the hum of a modern data center. Last week, I visited one of the largest in Santa Clara, Calif., in the heart of Silicon Valley. It’s called SC1, is owned by DuPont Fabros Technology and is about a quarter-mile long.
"It’s about the same size and length as a Nimitz aircraft carrier," says Paul Hopkins, a regional vice president for the company, shortly after buzzing me through the door. The entrance is guarded, and employees need fingerprint scans to get in and out. Hopkins has agreed to show me around…
SC1 isn’t fully built out yet. But when it is, it will use enough electricity to power more than 57,000 homes. Just inside the door, there is a corridor that stretches in a straight line for more than 1,000 feet. "The guys that work here, a lot have their own little Razor scooters to get around," Hopkins says. "It’s a heck of a long walk if you’re walking back and forth all day."…
Read more from the source @ http://www.npr.org/blogs/alltechconsidered/2014/04/21/305666363/searching-the-planet-to-find-power-for-the-cloud
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