Let's Go back in time!!! USDCO Launches Underground Data Center in Former Mine. What Happen to them??? The Mine??
November 26, 2001 -- (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) -- A Michigan-based technology company has built a new data center in a 100 year-old mine to host computer equipment 85 feet below the Earth's surface. Underground Secure Data Center Operations (usdco.com), a Grand Rapids, Mich.-based data center, launched its operations in an inactive gypsum mine, deep underground and secure from disasters, both natural and manmade.
USDCO says the facility has advantages over traditional data centers, such as increased security, lower cost, scalability and ideal environmental conditions. USDCO said its economic model works, despite the proliferationof data center providers, thanks largely to the natural qualities inherent in the mine.
With 750,000 square feet available, there is lots of space to be subdivided to accommodate the growth needs of clients. In addition, the data center has an unlimited supply of naturally cool, 50-degree air, providing the ideal temperature and humidity for computer equipment with minimal HVAC cost. "We are one of the most secure data centers in the country and unparalleled in terms of square footage, scalability and environmental control," said Irvin Wolfson, USDCO partner. "Yet, while the physical and cost benefits of being underground make us attractive, we have also invested heavily in high-speed connectivity and redundant power and fiber systems to ensure our operations are not just secure, but also state-of-the-art."
USDCO said it is initially focused on providing co-location services. Clients lease space for their own servers, while USDCO provides secure facilities, power and bandwidth. USDCO offers redundant power sources and multiple high-speed Internet DS-3 connections through an OC-12 SONET ring linked to outside connectivity providers through redundant fiber cables. Through its alliances, the company augments its core services to include disaster recovery solutions, wireless connectivity and more.
Strategic partners like Analysts International, a national information technology company, enable USDCO to offer technology solutions ranging from System design and implementation to the sale of software and equipment. "The data center market is over-built with pricey Class A space or cut-rate Class C space that lacks true redundancy, capacity or security," Wolfson said. "The natural qualities of the mine allow us to offer the best of both worlds - premier services and security at highly competitive rates."
USDCO was established in Sept. 2000 when its founders realized the former gypsum mine offered optimal conditions for a data center. The mine, which was being used to store food and other cold-storage products, offered superior environmental conditions for electronic equipment, almost invulnerable security and was located between two power grids. The facility became operational in July 2001.
Adam Couture, a Mass.-based analyst for Gartner Inc. said USDCO could find itself a niche serving businesses that want to reduce vulnerability to any future attacks. A company fact sheet said that the mine would protect the data center from a cruise missile explosion or plane crash. "Every company that I've talked to all are going back and re-evaluating their business-continuity plans," Couture told Associated Press. "This doesn't say everybody's changing them, but everybody's going back and revisiting them in the wake of what happened."
Data Mining Goes Underground
Data centers strain local resources, don't hire locally, erect ugly buildings, and tear up city streets to complete fiber links. But USDCO might have the last laugh, sinking to new depths and stymieing critics while quarrying data into dollars.
ISP-Planet Associate Editor
[August 24, 2001]
There are four things that municipalities don't like about data centers. First, urban utility companies complain that these facilities put a strain on city power grids. Second, local government types fret about the fact that data centers provide little in the way of employment opportunities for the average Joe Citizen. Third, urban planners grumble that data centers are windowless warehouses contributing no aesthetic value to cityscapes or suburbia.
And last of all, but perhaps most important, cities are no longer enthusiastic about allowing their streets to be dug up to lay new fiber optic runs. Last year, local authorities in Washington, DC even placed a temporary ban on new fiber pipes—these anti-data storage facility sentiments are mimicked and murmured across the nation.
It's enough to make data center operators want to find a big hole and climb inside.
At least one data center operator has done just that. Underground Secure Data Center Operations (USDCO) opened for business in July and offers 750,000 square feet of data center space hidden deep inside a disused gypsum mine near Grand Rapids, Michigan.
The company was founded by six partners in September 2000 when the mine owner, food warehouser Michigan Natural Storage, decided to find out what else could be squirreled away in its underground expanse besides perishables. Because data has a better shelf-life than lettuce, the six-some decided that data storage could turn their subterrestrial real estate into a real gold mine.
Inside out buildup
Irvin Wolfson, USDCO partner and vice president of sales, and Bob Savage, USDCO vice president of IT, explained how the data center was built. Savage said USDCO's data storage solution would not be easy to imitate.
"Most data centers are built from the outside in," Savage said. "They're not scalable. If they're running out of room, you're talking about adding a power generator, building an additional facility next door—a lot of money. We can just throw up some walls and add a room. We're built from the inside out. We laid the cables and designed the center first, and we can grow as demand arrives."
Actually, there's a little more to it than that. First, USDCO created the data center space by pouring concrete on top of the solid rock floor. Next, simple metal walls are erected, creating a room (right) with an exterior that is adjacent to the rock walls of the mine (below).
The gypsum mine is level, rather than vertical. Hidden 85 feet below the earth's surface, the mine is roughly oval in shape, and it has a virtually unlimited supply of free, humid, 50-degree Fahrenheit air. USDCO simply hooks up two large fans in each room—one to push air in, the other to pull air through—and, presto! It has a cooling system that requires very little maintenance or power. Since the data center is underground, it is also not subjected to storms, fires, or other natural disasters. In theory, mines might be vulnerable to flooding or earthquakes, but these are geological rarities for inland Michigan.
Additionally, subterranean security is a breeze—there just aren't that many doors and windows in a cavern. What systems could be knocked out by Mother Nature or ill-intended intruders are readily righted by redundancy.
USDCO operates its data plant with a fully redundant power plus backup generators and two upstream providers. It would take a cataclysmic event to to put data stored at USDCO in harm's way. Even if power is somehow interrupted, the data storage facility would be one of the first locations brought back on-grid because its food storage capabilities on the other side of the servers.
It also has redundant access to upstream providers, USDCO has an internal OC-12 SONET ring connected to Sprint and Cable & Wireless through redundant fiber cables—one connection made out of each end of the mine—through a DS3 pipe from Ameritech. Savage says that the company also has dark fiber ready, if necessary, "up to OC-192 and beyond if a customer requires it."
Data treasure trove
Is USDCO buying other mines? "We have options on other sites," said Wolfson, "but we want to be self-financed. We've had VC offers because our business plan is obviously good and obviously different, but we want to grow organically. Also—it may be a Western Michigan thing—but we believe in something called 'service.' We don't want to expand too fast."
USDCO might have financed the operation alone, but it did not go solo when it came to powering up the facility. Michigan Natural Storage, USDCO partner and the mine's owner, played an important role in bringing power to the data center and helped the fledgling business hookup with potential clients, too.
USDCO, through its partners, can provide tape rotation, server monitoring, and database services for any size and type of businesses. Partners are welcome to provide more lucrative services like consulting and equipment sales, too. One partner, SequoiaNet provides a wide variety of Web-based services and is licensed to sell Dell, HP, IBM, and Compaq products. But Wolfson says that USDCO serves small- and medium-size businesses with gold-standard storage solutions.
"We're a new company. For a facility of this size, we're unusual because we also work with small companies that have annual business of less than $10,000," Wolfson said. "With power included, the monthly price of a collocated server is about $100 for 1U, plus $80 per additional 1U, with 10 GB of monthly throughput included."
USDCO can afford to offer low rates for its data services. With low rent and minimal property taxes, as well as curtailed cooling costs and easy expansion capabilities, USDCO is sitting pretty in the bowels of the earth. And with 750,000 square feet of data storage space available, USDCO just may turn this depleted gypsum hollow into a real gold mine. 09-16-2003Tina
I've heard that part of the problem is the city wanted them to be completely 'up to code'. As in, running sprinkler systems, bathrooms, fire exits, etc. down there.
I loved that place. But I don't have the stomach for that kind of uncertainty and pulled out a short while before they closed up.
Hello??? Its a freakin' MINE!!!!
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