Located at a former military bunker in Uitikon, just outside of Zurich, the highly secure data storage facility will be used to support GIB customers in Switzerland. This also marks a first-of-its-kind energy model where a direct heat exchange will occur between the facility and a public swimming pool in the town.

The data center is expected to generate 2,800MW of wasted heat per year when operating at full capacity, which is enough energy to supply up to 80 houses with heating and warm water for one year. Then town is seeking to redirected some of this otherwise wasted energy to ensure provide a comfortable temperature for swimming in the town pool.

"This is a great example of an innovative client solution that not only provides a client with a secure and energy efficient data center, but is also a technology breakthrough to benefit the town," says Steve Sams, VP of IBM global site and facilities services. "Theoretically it is possible to reuse up to 90 percent of the electric power required for the operation of the data center as heat energy. Through reclaiming the heat, approximately 130 tons of carbon emissions can be saved. This corresponds to the carbon dioxide discharge of mid-size cars driving 500,000 miles."

GIB-Services is a Swiss IT company that offers site and colocation services. The company will lease out space in the new data center bunker to customers with high demands on protection and availability.

The facility agreement was signed in 2007 and recently completed in the first quarter of 2008. The project to transfer heat to the public swimming pool was signed in the first quarter of 2008 and will be completed in the next few months, says IBM.

The GIB-Services facility is part of IBM's 'Project Big Green' (ibm.com/press/projectbiggreen), announced last May. This $1 billion initiative strives to significantly reduce energy use by IBM and its customers through developing and using new energy efficient IBM products and services, as well as a five step approach to energy efficiency in the data center.

If followed, IBM says the program can reduce data center energy consumption and turn clients' technology infrastructure into green data centers, while providing energy savings of up to 42 percent for an average data center.

Last week, the company finished building a data center for Egypt-based telecommunications provider Telecom Egypt as part of its Project Big Green initiative.