China puts ‘world’s first’ offshore wind-powered underwater data center into operation

May 18, 2026, by Adrijana Buljan

An underwater data center (UDC) connected directly to an offshore wind farm has been put into operation off the coast of China’s Lingang Special Area of China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, Chinese media reports.

Offshore wind-powered UDC in Shanghai; Photo source: Lin-gang Special Area / Wenhui Daily

The project, said to be the world’s first of this kind, was officially launched in June 2025 with the signing of a cooperation agreement between the administrative committee of the Lingang Special Area of China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, Shanghai Lingang Special Area Investment Holding Group, and HiCloud Technology.

According to information from June 2025, the project is being developed in two phases. The first phase is set up as a demonstration facility with a capacity of 2.3 MW, which is scaled up to 24 MW through the project’s second phase.

In October 2025, the Chinese government announced that the construction of “the world’s first wind-powered underwater data center (UDC) project” was completed, with the project providing “a demonstration for the green and low-carbon development of computing infrastructure and for the local consumption of offshore wind power.”

In February this year, Lingang Special Area said the CNY 1.6 billion (approximately $228 million) UDC with a total capacity of 24 MW was launched.

The data center is located 10 meters under water, between the first and second phases of Lin-gang’s offshore wind farm, with the UDC modules positioned adjacent to offshore wind turbines, using seawater for natural cooling and electricity supplied directly by the wind farm.

According to the project developers, the system reduces electricity consumption by 22.8%, eliminates water use, and cuts land use by more than 90%. The facility’s power usage effectiveness (PUE) is maintained at around 1.15, which is among industry-leading levels, according to its developers.

The GPU servers installed within the underwater modules support applications ranging from big data annotation to the development of domestic large language models (LLMs), while enabling coordinated allocation of computing resources between offshore and onshore facilities.

Computing clusters from companies, including China Telecom, have already been deployed, alongside local computing service providers such as LinkWise, Lingang Special Area said earlier this year.