Notes from the Consultant’s Jungle

I promised an update on the progress of the ship-based data center concept floated (yes a pun) by International Data Security (IDS).  A recent post on Silverback’s blog explains that the first launch (perhaps a pun) is now delayed until Q3 of 2008, and gives a few more details.

IDS continues to see the ship-based data center concept as a lucrative opportunity, given the continued demand for data center space, the notion that ship-based data centers can reduce the time to market by as much as 65% and that the Cap-Ex is estimated to be a third less than a comparable brick and mortar facility.

We talked in the earlier post about the potential Green opportunities with this concept, leveraging the massive on-board (bio-diesel fueled) generators and use of ambient sea water for cooling.  IDS now adds that since the ship does not need access to transmission lines there is greater efficiency through elimination of transmission loss, does not use in-ground fuel storage tanks, and the fact that they are salvaging cargo ships that would otherwise be scrapped.  That final point is perhaps a reach, given that retired ships are often used for recycled steel anyway.

I did find the point interesting that, with the first vessel to be docked in San Francisco, this concept provides a degree of earthquake tolerance, since the ship itself is unaffected by earthquakes.  That’s an advantage I hadn’t thought of before and is an interesting option for metropolitan areas subject to those sorts of events.

Besides the updates from Silverback and IDS, I’ve also learned that it’s likely that the Container Data Center units installed on-deck will be Rackable’s Ice Cube.  This is another feather in the cap for the Ice Cube and Container Data Center applications in general.

IDS is still in the hunt for Customers, so if you’re in need of trend-setting data center space in San Francisco there’s still time to climb aboard (oh no, another pun).