Google’s new data center in Council Bluffs, Iowa, is all set to go. A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held yesterday, and so the search giant has pretty well signaled that it’s ready to forge ahead (in at least this one way) despite the recession.
A little over a month ago, there were reports that Google might have put its plans to build a data center in Australia on hold. More recently, Google got a patent relating to water-based data centers. Then there’s Microsoft’s move to consider; in January, it officially decided to delay the construction of a data center in Iowa.
But the Google data center’s manager, Chris Russell, was all smiles at the opening ceremony, “This represents about a 600 million dollar investment and we’re really happy to be here,” he said according to Meghan Youker. “It’s been two years in the making and now we’re online so it’s great.”
People on the other side of the equation seem pleased, too. Iowa Governor Chet Culver said, “It really puts our state not only on the national map, but on the international map when it comes to information technology.”
The one remaining question relates to what purpose, precisely, the new data center will serve . . . whether, for example, Google.com, Google Maps, or the recently outage-prone Google News will get the biggest boost from it.
