Apple Purchases 200 Acres for Second Solar Farm Near North Carolina Data Center

[MacRumors]

Earlier this year, Apple announced that as part of an effort to power all of its data centers with 100% renewable energy it would be building a second 20-megawatt solar farm a few miles away from its new Maiden, North Carolina data center. The new solar farm would complement the previously announced 20-megawatt facility that appears to be nearing completion directly across the street from the data center.

Solar panels at Apple's first North Carolina solar farm (Source: Jeremy Detter/Hickory Daily Record)​

The location of the second solar farm was not immediately revealed at that time, but the Hickory Daily Record now reports (via 9to5Mac) that Apple has just purchased 200 acres land for the solar farm at a cost of $3 million. The plot is located nearly 15 miles from the data center and is being co-located with a new North Carolina Data Campus designed to attract other companies in need of data center capacity.

Apple recently closed on the land purchase that includes a tract of 218.885 acres and another tract of 0.251 acres, according to deeds and a plat book at the Catawba County Register of Deeds. [...]

The Conover site is the only other property Apple now owns in the area in addition to the main data center campus and solar farm in Maiden. With the two solar farms and a bio-gas-powered 5-megawatt fuel cell installation, it will be the largest non-utility installation in the country, according to Apple. The company expects to generate 124 million kWh a year, which would power the equivalent of 10,874 homes, Apple says on its website.

Several local governments have banded together to create the new North Carolina Data Campus, which has purchased an additional 55 acres for its purposes at the site. Facebook and Microsoft had reportedly looked at the site as a potential data center, but ultimately selected other locations due to a lack of existing infrastructure. The new data campus entity will work to provide the necessary infrastructure in order to make the site more appealing to other companies.

Article Link: Apple Purchases 200 Acres for Second Solar Farm Near North Carolina Data Center

 

[Z400Racer37]

I wonder how long it takes them to break even on these things lol?

 

[basesloaded190]

200 acres for $3 million? Now that is one sweet deal.

 

[Theclamshell]

I was thinking that seems like a good deal also hahaha.

 

[TorontoPolar]

Bunch of Hippies

Solar? What a bunch of wimpy liberals.

If they really wanted to generate some power, they'd built a big coal power plant right next to the data center. The smog will keep people from getting to close to the data center

 

[HarryKeogh]

Unfortunately, they used the Maps app on iOS 6 and accidentally placed the solar panels on Neptune.

 

[shareef777]

What if a tornado/hurricane ripped thru that solar farm, how would their DC continue to be powered.

 

[TallManNY]

What if a tornado/hurricane ripped thru that solar farm, how would their DC continue to be powered.

Probably very similar to the way it operates at night. The DC is connected to the main grid and Apple will get most of its energy from the Grid. Just at sunny times the solar facility will generate much more energy than the DC needs so Apple will sell that energy to the utility. It will net out that Apple runs only on renewable, but most of the time (all night and during cloudy days) it will not be running on electricity generated by the solar facility.

 

[SatManager]

Yet they are not doing solar at the data center they are planning for Reno, Nevada. If they wanted solar they should be looking at Arizona or southern Nevada.

 

[wutang61]

what a waste of land space.

 

[Intarweb]

I expect mother nature to make Apple feel it's wrath with how many trees they've destroyed for iCloud. They tried to get all friendly with her by calling it i"Cloud". But she knows. She knows.

 

[ghostlyorb]

Probably very similar to the way it operates at night. The DC is connected to the main grid and Apple will get most of its energy from the Grid. Just at sunny times the solar facility will generate much more energy than the DC needs so Apple will sell that energy to the utility. It will net out that Apple runs only on renewable, but most of the time (all night and during cloudy days) it will not be running on electricity generated by the solar facility.

Well said. Mostly for publicity, I assume.

 

[NT1440]

What if a tornado/hurricane ripped thru that solar farm, how would their DC continue to be powered.

From what I remember it has a natural gas backup generator system.

Data centers always have redundancy built in.

 

[rmatthewware]

That's got to be a *itch to mow, having to get under all those panels.

 

[NT1440]

That's got to be a *itch to mow, having to get under all those panels.

Jobs baby

 

[ConCat]

Unfortunately, they used the Maps app on iOS 6 and accidentally placed the solar panels on Neptune.

Neptune is a very nice planet.

 

[Blomkvist]

From what I remember it has a natural gas backup generator system.

Data centers always have redundancy built in.

My cubicle after lunch serves as the natural gas backup for my company. Har har har, couldn't resist.

 

[NT1440]

My cubicle after lunch serves as the natural gas backup for my company. Har har har, couldn't resist.

Hmmm, patent idea for crowdsourcing natural gas production......

Anyone know where I can find a chair sized funnel?

 

[gigabytex]

Can't wait to see how many acres of forest will be bulldozed for Apple's next "green" energy source.

 

[Intarweb]

That's got to be a *itch to mow, having to get under all those panels.

It's ok. Apple is used to hiring below minimum wage non-Americans for everything else. This should be no different for them.

 

[ncmac7101]

Can't wait to see how many acres of forest will be bulldozed for Apple's next "green" energy source.

Do your homework so you don't appear to be stupid. I drive by the site on my way yo Atlanta on a regular basis. Much of the site was fields. The number of trees that came down was minimal. The yellow outline is what Apple bought. Many of the trees are still there.

 

[velocityg4]

There are two subjects I've had questions about with the datacenters.

1. What computers and OS are used to run the datacenters? Since the XServe is dead. Does Apple make their private own server running OS X? Are they hackintoshes? Do they just use servers from IBM or HP running Linux, Unix or Z/OS?

2. Who is their ISP? What is the connection speed and type used here? How much is the monthly internet bill?

200 acres for $3 million? Now that is one sweet deal.

It depends on where you live. Out in the boonies you can get that for a few thousand dollars. I guess Apple got as far away from a city as they could get for their monsterous internet connection.

 

[Laird Knox]

What if a tornado/hurricane ripped thru that solar farm, how would their DC continue to be powered.

The data center will have redundant connections to the power grid. However, anything that takes out the solar farm will also likely take out the grid at some level.

Then there is the natural gas generator but it doesn't have enough capacity to power the entire data center on its own.

The final fallback will be a row of diesel generators. In the event of an outage they will automatically kick in and provide the power needed.

Now in the worst case if something took out the solar farm and the power grid then there is a good chance that the network connection are also down. That's why they are building multiple data centers across the country.

 

[york2600]

1. What computers and OS are used to run the datacenters? Since the XServe is dead. Does Apple make their private own server running OS X? Are they hackintoshes? Do they just use servers from IBM or HP running Linux, Unix or Z/OS?

You can get an idea of the systems that Apple runs from their job hiring pages. In the past it's been noted that they heavily utilize IBM systems, but they also seem to have a lot of HP equipment too. They run a lot of different OS flavors including BSD and Linux. Occasionally you'll even see them hiring Windows server admins.

2. Who is their ISP? What is the connection speed and type used here? How much is the monthly internet bill?

Any large datacenter is fed through highly redundant Internet connections. Multiple ISPs and multiple paths so you don't even enter the building at the same point. I have small datacenters being fed by 2 ISPs, but anything at Apple's scale is going to be utilizing just about ever ISP they can get connectivity to. A datacenter I use in Las Vegas provides a blended connection to your rack from 20 ISPs. That's not uncommon. Also if you're Apple's size your Internet connection setup is a bit different. All ISPs connect to each other in what's called a peering setup. The idea is that they connect fiber between points in their backbone knowing that they will each exchange equal amounts of traffic. That's the basic idea behind the Internet. If you are a large company like MS, Apple, or Google you generally peer directly with the ISPs. A great example would be CENIC, which is a massive private network that California runs. It connects every school and library in the state. Both MS and Google peer directly to CENIC. If you're in a college watching You Tube you went direct from state owned fiber to a Google Datacenter.

 

[ctdonath]

Can't wait to see how many acres of forest will be bulldozed for Apple's next "green" energy source.

what a waste of land space.

Environmentalists have been demanding "renewable energy" for a long time.
Solar power has been touted as wonderful and desirable for a long time.
Well, there it is. That's what solar strip-mining looks like.