Water-based data center

• US 7,525,207 B2
• Filed: 02/26/2007
• Issued: 04/28/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 02/26/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Hamburgen, William, Clidaras, Jimmy, Stiver, David W.
• Primary Examiner(s): Ponomarenko; Nicholas
• Application Number:
  US11/679,013
• Publication Number:
  US 20080209234A1
• Time in Patent Office: 792 Days
• Field of Search: 290/42, 290/43, 290/44, 290/53, 290/54, 290/55, 415/2
• US Class Current: 290/43
• CPC Class Codes: F03B 13/1885 and the wom is tied to the rem
• CPC Class Codes: F03B 13/20 wherein both members , i.e. wom and rem are movable relative to the sea bed or shore
• CPC Class Codes: F05B 2210/16 Air or water being indistinctly used as working fluid, i.e. the machine can work equally with air or water without any modification
• CPC Class Codes: F05B 2220/708 Photoelectric means, i.e. photovoltaic or solar cells
• CPC Class Codes: F05B 2240/917 attached to cables
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 7/1497 Rooms for data centers; Shipping containers therefor
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 7/2079 within rooms for removing heat from cabinets
• CPC Class Codes: Y02E 10/30 Energy from the sea, e.g. using wave energy or salinity gradient

Abstract

A system includes a floating platform-mounted computer data center comprising a plurality of computing units, a sea-based electrical generator in electrical connection with the plurality of computing units, and one or more sea-water cooling units for providing cooling to the plurality of computing units.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

a computer data center proximate to a body of water comprising a plurality of computing units;

a sea-based electrical generator in electrical connection with the plurality of computing units; and

one or more sea-water cooling units for providing cooling to the plurality of computing units.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the computing units are mounted in a plurality of crane-removable modules.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the sea-based electrical generator comprises a wave-powered generator system.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the sea-based electrical generator comprises a plurality of motion-powered machines arranged in a grid and wired together.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the wave-powered electrical generator system comprises one or more Pelamis machines.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the sea-based electrical generator comprises a tide-powered generator system.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the cooling units comprise a plurality of sea-powered pumps and one or more seawater-to-freshwater heat exchangers.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the sea-water cooling units comprise one or more water-to-water heat exchangers.

9. The system of claim 1, further comprising one or more rectifiers for producing direct current supply power from power supplied by the electrical generator.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the rectifiers provide power directly to components in the plurality of computing units without further DC-to-AC conversion of the power.

11. The system of claim 10, further comprising a plurality of step-down transformers to convert the direct current power to a voltage usable by the components in the plurality of computing units.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein the sea-based electrical generator comprises one or more wind turbines.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the one or more wind turbines provide pumping power for the sea-water cooling units.

14. The system of claim 1, further comprising a supplemental chiller cooling system on a platform with the data center to provide additional cooling when the one or more sea-water cooling units is insufficient.

15. The system of claim 1, wherein the computer data center comprises a floating-platform mounted data center.

16. A method of maintaining a computer data center, comprising:

generating electrical power using the wave, tidal, or current motion of water adjacent a data center;

providing the generated electrical power to the data center; and

circulating the water adjacent the data center through a heat exchanger to produce cooling for the data center equipment.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the electrical power is generated by the force of a floating device against moving waves.

18. The system of claim 16, wherein the on-board or on-shore data center equipment comprises a large plurality of computer boards mounted in rack arrays.