China says ‘world’s first’ offshore wind-powered underwater data center has entered full operation, houses 2,000 servers — 24 megawatt subsea AI facility uses ocean water for passive cooling and offshore wind for power
https://www.tomshardware.com/tech-industry/china-says-worlds-first-offshore-wind-powered-underwater-data-center-has-entered-full-operation-houses-2-000-servers-24-megawatt-subsea-ai-facility-uses-ocean-water-for-passive-cooling-and-offshore-wind-for-power
36 Comments
Actually insane how ahead of the game they are.
Edit: the link below my comment was a failed project, and in comparison the size of a shoe box compared to what China is doing here
> The project, officially launched in June 2025 and completed in October 2025
That seems like a quick turnaround to build something like this, no?
Cutting out the middle steps of heating the oceans. Can’t wait for our glorious future!
*Edit: fuck, reddit is weird.
This….isn’t actually good though. As more companies start doing off shore sub-surface data centers ( cause more will come ) we are going to see them raise ocean temps and more marine life die off as weather patterns get more erratic from the increased water in the atmosphere…..ahhhhhh I hate it here
Oceans have always been too cold for me to swim in tbh. I’m glad someone is trying to fix that.
The ‘This Is Fine’ meme is literally humans.
There’s no way this doesn’t heat the water up. I know it’s just one now, but when theil and all the other billionaires start doing this I can see it becoming a problem for marine life, not that they care about that or anything.
Space travell will not be for tourists they will be for the cooling effect of the void on servers. THE DEATH STAR IS A SERVER HOST
Microsoft did a test datacenter years ago and while it worked they did not see a need to continue. Wind powered ocean cooled AI data seems like a better solution than the idiotic space idea or trying to dump the power and water costs onto the locals of whatever state you build in.
Oceans are greenhouse gas sinks and extreme heat sinks for earth. Have they calculated/do they care what happens when you pump all this extra heat into our oceans?
“Okay, let me show you the next location where we will install one of your boxes.”
After working on so many projects where it has been said “we’re not trying to boil the ocean” and here we’re literally going to boil the ocean.
/s tag just to make it clear I’m joking, as others have commented how small of an impact this has on an ocean scale, although maybe there’s local effects.
None of the promises of AI are coming to fruition. The only thing we’re getting is more state surveillance and surveillance capitalism. Destroying the planet to subjugate the people. Late stage capitalism is wild.
How many data centers can be dipped in the ocean before their heat affects currents?
Heating the ocean does not have zero environmental impact.
Wishing the best to the ever dying coral.
We’re so cooked…
Good news since the oceans aren’t warming. s/
This should have no affect in ocean temps right
Small. Is 1/375th of the planned Utah data center.
Seems like warming the oceans further will be great for us in the long run. /s
Really not that hard to do. Well done China again
What could go wrong heating the oceans even more?
I’m sure this won’t have any negative affect on oceanlife either from temperature fluctuations or the sound, but obviously we’re fully intending of destroying the entire planet because it’s profitable.
Won’t it be a full time job to stop it getting biological growth all of it? Like within weeks it’ll need removing and scraping down back to the hull. Unless they put it in some sort of giant underwater data centre condom and just change that out every few weeks.
Have we tried deleting the ozone layer to improve satellite internet bandwidth yet?
Who is overseeing the negative effects this will be causing on wildlife and the environment?
There’s no such thing as passive cooling.
Hot water coming soon!
Well, they have the unfair advantage of oceans and windmills.
Trump’s cheeks are wind powered
I’m no expert but….even with the world moving slowly to green energy, isn’t the ai crap going to undo any gains that has achieved? And then some?
Every day we get closer to the end of the book starfish
In the ocean floor. What could go wrong.
It’s always been frustrating to me that we cannot harness the ocean currents for power. Is that not significantly more efficient?
Keep in mind, the people here acting like they know the pros and cons of an underwater data center are probably in middle school