Agreement signed for first offshore wind-powered underwater data center in China

A newly launched project in China is set to build what the project partners say will be the world’s first commercial underwater data center powered by offshore wind.

The project will be developed in two phases, with the first phase being a demonstration facility and the second phase scaling up the capacity to commercial scale.

The project was officially launched on June 10 with the signing of a cooperation agreement between the administrative committee of the Lingang Special Area of China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, where the facility will be built, Shanghai Lingang Special Area Investment Holding Group, and HiCloud Technology.

According to HiCloud Technology, the company has relocated its headquarters to Lingang and rebranded, and will invest CNY 1.6 billion (approximately €195 million) into building the offshore wind-powered subsea data center.

The first, pilot phase will have a capacity of 2.3 MW, with a designed power usage effectiveness (PUE) of no higher than 1.15 and a green power supply rate exceeding 97%. This will later be scaled up to 24 MW through the project’s second phase.

Su Yang, General Manager of HiCloud, said that the Lingang Underwater Data Center (UDC) will create a “land-based data, sea-based computing” model to meet AI/5G computing demands, bring a new “wind-computing synergy” approach to the market to utilize offshore wind energy, and explore cross-border data flow mechanisms to support global business expansion.

HiCloud has also signed agreements with Shenergy, Shanghai Telecom, CCCC Third Harbor Engineering, Biren Technology, and Linke Zhihua. “This collaboration brings together resources across the entire industrial chain—spanning ‘green, autonomous, intelligent, and offshore’ domains—to jointly build a green and intelligent computing ecosystem”, HiCloud said.