Datacenter Articles on TUAW - The Unofficial Apple Weblog

North Carolina approves Apple's plans for 4.8-megawatt fuel cell facility

by Steven Sande (May 24th, 2012)

Things are looking green around Apple's Maiden, North Carolina data center, and it's not just due to the fact that it's springtime. The North Carolina Utilities Commission has approved (PDF) Apple's plans to construct and operate a 4.8-megawatt fuel cell facility at the data center, providing ...

Greenpeace activists protest Apple by blocking train tracks

by Kelly Hodgkins (May 4th, 2012)

Greenpeace activists tried to stop Apple's coal consumption at its source by blocking train tracks that Duke Energy uses to ship coal to Apple's Maiden, North Carolina data center. Activists targeted the Marshall Steam Station in Catawba county, according to a report in Charlotte's ...

Apple confirmed as Bloom Energy's customer

by Megan Lavey-Heaton (Apr 30th, 2012)

CNet confirmed today that Bloom Energy will be supplying fuel cells to Apple. This will go toward powering Apple's North Carolina data center. GigaOM originally reported last month that Bloom Energy would be Apple's supplier for the fuel-cell farm. There will be 4.8 megawatts of biogas fuel ...

Apple makes a tax deal for Prineville, Oregon data center land

by Mike Schramm (Apr 23rd, 2012)

We've heard before that Apple plans to build a data center on land it previously purchased in Oregon, but now the Associated Press reports on part of the cost. The company has reportedly agreed to pay US$150,000 per year to local governments, and has signed off on at least 35 jobs. Those jobs ...

Greenpeace's math is wrong, according to Apple

by Victor Agreda, Jr. (Apr 18th, 2012)

Rich Miller at Data Center Knowledge has a good rundown of how Greenpeace's math is a bit wonky in a report called "How Clean is Your Cloud?" For one, Greenpeace estimates Apple will use 100 megawatts of power at the Maiden, NC plant, but Apple states it will be 20 megawatts at full ...

Amazon data center guru questions logic of Apple's solar farm

by Kelly Hodgkins (Mar 23rd, 2012)

James Hamilton is a former datacenter architect for Microsoft and the current datacenter guy for Amazon. In a recent blog post, he examines solar-powered data centers which he says are "really somewhere between a bad idea and pure marketing, where the environmental impact is purely optical." As ...

A video aerial view of Apple's NC data center

by Steven Sande (Mar 22nd, 2012)

Apple's 500,000 square foot, US$1 billion data center in Maiden, North Carolina has been in operation for a while, and there's a huge 20 Megawatt solar power generation facility that's now under construction nearby. While Steve Jobs showed off the above photo of the interior of the facility at ...

Daily Update for February 22, 2012

by Megan Lavey-Heaton (Feb 22nd, 2012)

It's the TUAW Daily Update, your source for Apple news in a convenient audio format. You'll get all the top Apple stories of the day in three to five minutes for a quick review of what's happening in the Apple world. You can listen to today's Apple stories by clicking the inline player (requires ...

Apple to build second data center in Oregon

by Mike Schramm (Feb 21st, 2012)

News network KTVZ has confirmed with Apple that the company plans to build another big data center on a 160-acre section of land just outside of Crook County, Oregon. The land that the data center will be built on cost Apple US$5.6 million. Until February 15, the paperwork that solidified the deal ...

Daily Update for December 5, 2011

by Steven Sande (Dec 5th, 2011)

Apple reportedly considering Prineville, Oregon for data center

by Kelly Hodgkins (Dec 5th, 2011)

Apple may follow in the footsteps of Facebook and build a 31-megawatt data center in Prineville, Oregon. The Cupertino company is considering the 160-acre property because of Oregon's low energy cost. The state also has a favorable tax break that could save Apple millions in property ...

Apple to build a solar farm next to North Carolina data center

by Kelly Hodgkins (Oct 26th, 2011)

Apple is reportedly building a solar farm to provide energy for its North Carolina data center. An erosion permit granted by Catawba County, North Carolina gives Apple permission to transform 171 acres of vacant land across from the data center into a solar farm. The area will be resloped and ...

Northlake, North Carolina Apple Store to open this month

by Mike Schramm (Aug 8th, 2011)

According to a writer at a local Charlotte, North Carolina blog, a source inside the upcoming Apple Store in the Northlake area says it could open as soon as August 25 or 26. This store won't be far from Apple's big North Carolina data center. Last May, we heard that it was moving from a ...

Why didn't we see a Nuance announcement during WWDC?

by Kelly Hodgkins (Jun 7th, 2011)

One major rumor missing from the WWDC keynote yesterday was voice control. It was just last year that Apple purchased Siri, a popular voice companion app for iOS. Apple was also rumored to be working with Nuance to offer some form of voice control in its software. References to Nuance were ...

Apple's North Carolina data center now visible on Google Earth

by Kelly Hodgkins (Jun 1st, 2011)

Apple's humongous data center in North Carolina is now visible on Google Earth and Google Maps satellite view. You can see the entire building and two roads leading in and out of the compound. Oddly, there is no space for on-site employee parking, at least not yet. An eagle-eyed reader picked ...