EXCLUSIVE: Scottish waves could power the internet
By Rob Edwards, Environment Editor

Imagine it. Every time you click on a Google search, your request is answered by huge banks of internet computers floating around Scotland's coast, powered by the sea. It may sound like science fiction, but the internet giant, Google, has already filed a patent for boats packed full of mainframe servers, driven by electricity from wave power machines under development in Scotland.

And it's just one of a raft of proposals by major companies set to make Scotland a global centre for the army of powerful computers that keep the internet going by exploiting the nation's inexhaustible supplies of clean, renewable energy.

The rapid expansion of the internet, now accessed by 1.6 billion people, demands ever more power. Despite the efficiency of computer "data centres" rising by 30% a year, the total amount of electricity they demand is doubling every five to eight years.

According to Jonathan Koomey from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, 152 billion kilowatt hours of electricity were consumed by data centres in 2005. This was about 1% of the world energy total, more than that consumed by Sweden but less than that consumed by South Africa.

Koomey points out that the internet is also making major resource savings by reducing the need for printed publications or for people to travel for work or shopping. "Moving electrons is always less environmentally damaging than moving atoms," he said.

But for the internet to keep expanding, there will be a growing need for more major computer centres, and the power to feed them. That's why the hunt is now on for the best and most climate-friendly places to site such data farms.

Google has filed a patent in the US for a ship packed with containers full of computers to act as a "floating data centre". It envisages a flotilla of these ships between three and seven miles offshore, using sea water to cool the computers and snake-like wave devices, called Pelamises, bobbing alongside, harnessing the power of the waves.

Google engineers estimate an array of 40 Pelamis snaking over a square kilometre could produce enough to power a 30-megawatt data centre. Pelamis Wave Power in Leith, near Edinburgh, installed a wave machine off Portugal last year, and is now building a device for the power company E.on.

At the same time the US investment bank Morgan Stanley, and Atlantis Resources Corporation in Singapore, have announced £300 million plans for a 150-megawatt data centre at Castle of Mey in Caithness. It will be powered by tidal turbines in the Pentland Firth, and aims to be up and running by 2011.

Alchemy Plus, a technology partner of computer giant Microsoft is planning a large, £20m data centre in Inverness. The area's relatively low temperatures will help reduce cooling costs, the company said.

There are also ambitious proposals for a data centre near Lockerbie in Dumfries and Galloway covering 250,000 square metres. According to the company behind the scheme, Lockerbie Data Centres, it will rely on wind power and a biomass generator.

Dr Richard Dixon, director of WWF Scotland, said: "The fact that Scotland has huge riches in renewable energy opens up new business opportunities for any big energy user conscious of their impact on the planet.

"The internet service companies have become more aware of their climate change impact as computing power has increased. The combination of 100% clean energy and an IT-savvy workforce makes Scotland the ideal location to house Europe's data centres."

Dixon called on the Scottish government to aggressively pursue the idea that Scotland is the place to site data centres. "The Pentland Firth proposals seem a bit wacky at first, but they are exactly the kind of new idea that could catch the IT industry's imagination," he argued.