Apple to invest $1B in Nevada data center, business facilities

Building any type of long term business in Nevada or other desert states in the west is foolish. They already have a water supply problem. When it gets worse there will be rationing all of the time and eventually it will need to be trucked in. Maybe when the water is gone Apple can pay employees to stay in a nearly abandoned city just the way seamen get paid for staying at sea for months at a time. They can rotate employees and have food shipped to the facility since there won't be any grocery stores open there.

 

The western desert states aren't out of water yet but they're getting there fast. Maybe all of the tax breaks make it worthwhile.
 

[quote name="AppleInsider" url="/t/150923/apple-to-invest-1b-in-nevada-data-center-business-facilities#post_2134803"]Apple is looking to sink $1 billion over the next ten years into a Reno, NV project that will include a data center dedicated to iCloud and a separately-located business and purchasing development. According to online postings from city and county officials uncovered by the Reno Gazette Journal, the deal was months in the making and encompasses both a downtown Reno data center and "business park" as well as a recently-proposed separate 2,200 acre data farm near Sparks, NV. The developers behind the massive undertaking, dubbed Project Jonathan, said that while the Reno facilities have been under planning for years, Apple only approached local and state officials about the Sparks center earlier this year. Being developed by Unique Infrastructure Group, LLC, the Reno Technology Park will feature 1.5 million square feet of space for Apple's data center and is expected to go online later in 2012. A report from consulting firm Applied Economics estimates that the overall economic impact of the project will be some $343 million while tax revenue from Apple over the next ten years is seen as netting local and state governments $16 million. The Cupertino, Calif. company will be getting an $89 million tax break including an 85 percent reduction in personal property tax for 10 to 30 years. Apple's effective sales tax rate is expected to be less than one percent. Much like Apple's Maiden, NC data center, the 2,200-acre unit near Sparks will use renewable energy sources. A 2010 report from Data Center Knowledge claims initial plans for the project are set to include on-site power generation including 100 megawatts of wind power, up to 20 megawatts of geothermal energy and solar power from a 20-megawatt photovoltaic installation.

The Reno Technology Park site will create about 580 construction jobs that bring an estimated $103 million boost to the local economy. Following completion of the data center, Apple plans to keep a permanent staff of about 35 full-time workers who will receive salaries of at least $25 per hour, according to a corporate letter addressed to the Nevada Governor's Office of Economic Development.[/quote] This does not compute. They just aproached the state and city earlier this year. They haven't started construction. They're building a 1.5 M square foot data center - and filling it with equipment. Yet they plan to be online later this year? I'll believe it when I see it. [quote name="Smallwheels" url="/t/150923/apple-to-invest-1b-in-nevada-data-center-business-facilities#post_2134811"]Building any type of long term business in Nevada or other desert states in the west is foolish. They already have a water supply problem. When it gets worse there will be rationing all of the time and eventually it will need to be trucked in. Maybe when the water is gone Apple can pay employees to stay in a nearly abandoned city just the way seamen get paid for staying at sea for months at a time. They can rotate employees and have food shipped to the facility since there won't be any grocery stores open there. The western desert states aren't out of water yet but they're getting there fast. Maybe all of the tax breaks make it worthwhile [/quote] Fortunately, a data center is not a huge water user. Just drinking water for the employees, water for cleaning, and that's about it. With 35 full time workers, trucking in water won't be an issue - even if things get as bad as you predict.

I'm glad to see Apple investing in data centers but I'd like to see more and faster growth in this segment. Anything to speed up and add redundancy to their cloud-based services is fine by me. Let's get a dozen of these for the US and one all the other countries to share.

I hope they dedicate about 5% of this data center to simply supporting the Contacts section of iCloud. It's slow.