January 19, 2007 | Posted By : Isabel Wang at 1:52 PM PERMALINK | Blog Comments (6)

New Google Data Center to Receive $100 Million in Tax Benefits from North Carolina

I read about it on ValleyWag: Google is going to build a $600 million data center in Lenoir, North Carolina. WRAL reports that Google will receive $100 million in tax benefits over the next 30 years. That's $500K for each of the 200 jobs that the data center is expected to create.

WRAL says North Carolina was going up against South Carolina for the Google project. Does that mean the rumored $750 million investment by "Maguro Enterprises" near the South Carolina coast isn't related to Google? Or has the "high tech development project that needs access to lots of electricity" been shelved? (Update from Rich Miller at Data Center Knowledge: South Carolina plans have NOT been put on hold. In addition to $600 million in North Carolina, Google plans to spend $1 billion+ on TWO facilities on South Carolina.)

By the way, as a point of comparison, Rich says Microsoft's tax abatement deal from San Antonio totals only $20.7 million. Microsoft plans to invest at least $550 million in the 470,000 square foot data center project; the facility is expected to create 75 jobs.

Speaking of data center locations, check out Pingdom's where-not-to-keep-servers map. I found out about that through Data Center Knowledge as well. Thanks, Rich!

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There is a larger issue to deal with here. If you are concerned about the statistical likelihood of your site being down due to a national disaster, you better deploy a geographically diverse configuration. Yes, there are plenty of places where hurricanes, tornados and earthquakes can occur... but you can't forget floods, plane crashes or car bombs. If your business needs to be up 100% of the time, you have no choice but to deploy a two-site location and configure replication as needed to meet your business rules. :-)

# Posted By Paul | 1/19/07 3:21 PM

Hi Paul, I agree - but building two red-zone data centers is still higher risk than two green-zone ones, no? Of course, there are lots of other factors to consider. For instance, check out Liam's recent post on data center operating costs, which vary widely across locations.

http://www.thewhir.com/blogs/liam-eagle/index.cfm/...

# Posted By Isabel Wang | 1/19/07 4:05 PM

Many of the companies looking for data centers in disaster-free zones often have at least one primary facility that, for business purposes, needs to be in either New York or an earthquake-sensitive California city. So it's often a case of looking for a "green zone" case to minimize business risk represented by the "red zone" primary center.

# Posted By Rich Miller | 1/19/07 5:05 PM

Maybe that's where "container colo" might come in handy? Instead of building red zone data centers in fixed locations, you get a bunch of Blackboxes from Sun. That way, in the worst case they can be air-lifted out if your current location is cut off from power or Internet access.

# Posted By Isabel Wang | 1/19/07 5:19 PM

Disaster recovery data centers are often part of a broader program to address regulatory mandates for data security. For instance, financial regulators want Wall Street firms to locate secondary data centers far enough away that they will survive a "regional event" that affects the primary data center. I don't know that a Blackbox in the parking lot (or on a rooftop in NYC, as imaged by one of the Sun pictures) will keep the regulators happy. The other issue is that 9-11 made companies consider DR plans that need to work if air travel is grounded - a scenario which would make a Blackbox airlift problematic.

# Posted By Rich Miller | 1/19/07 6:03 PM

I love being in Lansing Michigan :) Cheap power too.

# Posted By Travis Stoliker | 1/19/07 10:51 PM

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