Facebook is to build a new data centre in Odense, Denmark, the social media company announced at a press conference with local authorities.
The new 55,000 sq.m facility will be built on the outskirts of Denmark’s third largest city and according to Facebook’s director of data, Niall McEntergart, is to include at least 150 permanent jobs, as well as various jobs in the construction stage.
Speaking at the press conference, McEntegart said: “The Odense data centre will be one of the most advanced, energy-efficient data centres in the world.
“Our mission at Facebook is to connect the world and our data centres house the infrastructure that make it possible to connect billions of people.”
Facebook already has data centres located in Sweden and Ireland, making the Denmark site its third facility outside of the US.
The company also previously introduced new data centre equipment in 2016. The long-distance networking system, Voyager, is able to transfer data faster through optical fibre network.
A new data centre switch was also launched by Facebook in November 2016 with the ability to connect different racks of machines within a data centre.
The new site will be completely powered by clean, renewable energy. McEntegart explained that the use of cold climate could help in cooling servers, instead of relying on air conditioners.
McEntegart added: “There’s things like availability of fibre, which is excellent in this area, there’s the electricity grid, again excellent in this area. There’s also abundant Nordic clean renewable energy, which is very important for us from a sustainability point of view.”
The Danish Energy Minister Lars Lilleholt supported by saying Facebook’s decision was an example of Denmark’s strengths.
Lilleholt said in a statement: “We have one of the world’s greatest energy systems with large quantities of green energy, high security supply, good fibre connections and competitive power prices.”
Facebook has not yet disclosed when the site will be opening.
