Apple Athenry data centre

the whole year inn

Nettle Soup wrote: »

One of the objectors was criticised for his vested interest...

https://www.rte.ie/news/2017/1012/911735-apple-athenry/

Not even the main objection, he was a joke to be fair.

vicwatson

Never gonna be any other decision today

the whole year inn

_Whimsical_ wrote: »

They've said 300 construction jobs are expected.

According to RTE news all is not set in stone yet. Apple have not made any statement welcoming this judgement which they had been expected to do.
They also said that when Apple initially announced the plan to build here they also announced a similar centre which was set for Denmark. That centre has since been built and they've announced a second centre for the same area in Denmark recently.

My understanding is that Ireland Electric grid could not handle 2 data centers as the same size as of now.
Comparing Ireland to Denmark is not a fair representation.

_Whimsical_

the whole year inn wrote: »

My understanding is that Ireland Electric grid could not handle 2 data centers as the same size as of now.
Comparing Ireland to Denmark is not a fair representation.

I imagine it'll be Apple doing comparisons in order to decide who best suits their needs so I suppose we will have to tell them that it might be unfair. It is a little concerning they've greenlighted a second in Denmark recently and have made no statement re today's judgement here.

sgthighway

I think we should run a Poll now to guess how many jobs will be there long term. In a couple of years time people can look back.

stampydmonkey

First guess is zero! #rottenappleofftodenmark

_Whimsical_

sgthighway wrote: »

I think we should run a Poll now to guess how many jobs will be there long term. In a couple of years time people can look back.

I wonder where the figure of 15 came from today. It's mentioned in several different news bulletins today.

death1234567

vicwatson wrote: »

Never gonna be any other decision today

No but yet it still caused a huge delay and may lead to apple cancelling the whole project. Nobody will learn from it though and the civil service bureaucrats will still be a drain on the countries economy.

dubhthach

With regards employment, it's worth pointing out that this is the first of a proposed 8 data-centers for the site. Given the colocation of so many on the site obviously there will be 'synergy' when it comes to staffing NOC (Network Operations Center) etc.

Leaving that aside given the size of each individual datacenter 15 sounds like interesting figure, the relatively small data center I visit in Dublin generally has on order of 4-6 staff on duty during the day (including security guard, ignoring 'Sales staff' also on site). Of course the last Saturday I was there there was only 2 staff on duty, given that the Athenry site will only contain Apple owned systems alot of core management will be done offsite with the staff in Athenry basically been used for 'remote hands', monitoring of connectivity/power and doing racking/stacking of equipment (With remote teams doing the bring up etc.)

Hmm, based on the decision today I can definitely see this being appealed

Alan had legitimate concerns that were grounded in fact.

Also, just to pour a bit of cold water on things, don't forget, this permission applies to only the first data centre. The other 7 will require individual permissions to be sought for each one.

10000maniacs

You only get one bite of the cherry with Apple.
Once idiocy shows its ugly face, that is that.
If I ran Apple and came across this situation, I would build the data centre in Denmark instead, where there is no idiocy.
Methinks this is what has actually happened.

ezstreet5

I loved this quote from Pulitzer Prize-winning LA Times columnist Michael Hiltzik:

"Data centers such as the Apple facility are especially shiny baubles to dangle before suckers. That’s because they have the veneer of high-tech, even though in practical terms they’re low-tech."

(Referring to Apple's proposed Waukee, Iowa data centre)

10000maniacs

ezstreet5 wrote: »

I loved this quote from Pulitzer Prize-winning LA Times columnist Michael Hiltzik:

"Data centers such as the Apple facility are especially shiny baubles to dangle before suckers. That’s because they have the veneer of high-tech, even though in practical terms they’re low-tech."

(Referring to Apple's proposed Waukee, Iowa data centre)

I would think that any job at the plant beats working at the checkout in a supermarket.

JRant

While the result is welcomed, it should really be a stepping stone to overhauling the archan planning process. Time and again we see serial objectors costing millions to both the State and companies for what turn out to be spurious reasons.

It's been mentioned that we could possibly breach EU directives if we fail to meet specific renewable targets. Now, the most important question is why are we struggling? It's not due too data centres coming over here. Look at the simple fact that it takes years of planning to build a wind farm with regulations becoming more stringent. Best of luck trying to build full scale power plant or the transmission network to support it. Until these issues are addressed then all industries will suffer.

On the issue of staffing levels, it's not as straight forward as how many will be directly supplied. While they admittedly don't employee many directly they do employee a lot of people indirectly. Most work carried out in these places is through vendors. So you get a whole industry of ancillary services springing up around them. They also tend to armttract other large companies into an area with large campuses building up around them.

I really hope Apple go ahead with this project. There are many people who have left the West to find work in these exact industries. It would be great to see a proper campus spring up around it and provide a huge boost to the area. Here was a perfect example of an industry choosing that part of the country over the usual Dublin centric view and it could be shot down before it even started. Other companies might just look at this fiasco and say no thanks. This would be a great opportunity lost IMO.

hometruths

RoboKlopp wrote: »

Lol, that's the chap I heard about.

Delighted for him in particular.

More interesting info on this Brian McDonagh and his data centre interests in this thread:
http://www.thepropertypin.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=63277&p=899342#p899342

the whole year inn

JRant wrote: »

While the result is welcomed, it should really be a stepping stone to overhauling the archan planning process. Time and again we see serial objectors costing millions to both the State and companies for what turn out to be spurious reasons.

It's been mentioned that we could possibly breach EU directives if we fail to meet specific renewable targets. Now, the most important question is why are we struggling? It's not due too data centres coming over here. Look at the simple fact that it takes years of planning to build a wind farm with regulations becoming more stringent. Best of luck trying to build full scale power plant or the transmission network to support it. Until these issues are addressed then all industries will suffer.

On the issue of staffing levels, it's not as straight forward as how many will be directly supplied. While they admittedly don't employee many directly they do employee a lot of people indirectly. Most work carried out in these places is through vendors. So you get a whole industry of ancillary services springing up around them. They also tend to armttract other large companies into an area with large campuses building up around them.

I really hope Apple go ahead with this project. There are many people who have left the West to find work in these exact industries. It would be great to see a proper campus spring up around it and provide a huge boost to the area. Here was a perfect example of an industry choosing that part of the country over the usual Dublin centric view and it could be shot down before it even started. Other companies might just look at this fiasco and say no thanks. This would be a great opportunity lost IMO.

You have some valid points and agree with alot of what you said but the renewable targets how would/are we ever going to meet them, at this stage leo must be adding them into the budget and expecting us to pay.

the whole year inn

the whole year inn wrote: »

My understanding is that Ireland Electric grid could not handle 2 data centers as the same size as of now.
Comparing Ireland to Denmark is not a fair representation.

Where do you get your understanding from? How do we handle all the current data centres we have currently? As another poster with first hand of DCs said, they currently take up about 3% of the grids resources.

As for the question on the jobs, even 15 additional jobs to Athenry would be a big boost, but why would they request planning permission for 140 parking spaces for 15 people?

I worked in a DC in Dublin. There were about 20 parking spaces. I went in late one night and there was the security guard, the cleaner and Theresa who was senior NOC engineer, and Theresa was watching Coronation Street via the RTE player on the 8 foot projector used for NOC alerts(meanwhile there were 4 red alerts on Nagios according to my screen). Ive been in there when it was busy and the parking spaces were filled to capacity.

dubhthach

the whole year inn wrote: »

You have some valid points and agree with alot of what you said but the renewable targets how would/are we ever going to meet them, at this stage leo must be adding them into the budget and expecting us to pay.

Convert Moneypoint to Biomass would go along way to doing it. Of course there's also fact that there's something like 4GW of Solar in planning pipeline at the moment. ESB/Bord na Móna are for example in process of planning 570MW on cut away bogs. As long as they put in place some grid-scale batteries (like what Telsa have done in California, Hawaii and Samoa) it should help cover issues such as sunset

http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/esb-and-bord-na-mna-in-500m-solar-venture-to-power-150000-homes-35657227.html

dubhthach

Of course leaving that aside planning/design is already in process for building a 700MW interconnector to France eg. 'Celtic Interconnector', which give us a nice supply of French nuclear power going forth.





As part of this there's plans to put in a major Fibre cable as well, which will give access from Ireland (via Cork) to the continent avoiding the pinchpoint of London (and GCHQ monitoring) when it comes to network connectivity. I imagine the likes of Apple, Microsoft, Google and Amazon will all buy capacity on it.

what_traffic

dubhthach wrote: »

Of course leaving that aside planning/design is already in process for building a 700MW interconnector to France eg. 'Celtic Interconnector', which give us a nice supply of French nuclear power going forth.

Is this relevant to the thread?
Do Apple consider Nuclear "Green Energy"?
Thought they were trying to buy wind farms in IRE for the Derrydonnell Data Centers?

dubhthach

what_traffic wrote: »

Is this relevant to the thread?
Do Apple consider Nuclear "Green Energy"?
Thought they were trying to buy wind farms in IRE for the Derrydonnell Data Centers?

It's relevant to the discussion of data centers and the impact they have on the Irish grid. After all that was one of the arguments been made against this particular data center.

Secondly the undersea fibre cable that will be put in place along with the HVDC interconnector will provide the first direct Internet connectivity between Ireland and the continent (bypassing UK), this is important for both network latency (eg. traffic going to Paris won't go via London) as well as issues such as security (no GCHQ) and perhaps even Brexit.

The whole point of this complex in Athenry is not to deal with data requirements of iTunes/iCloud customers in Ireland but in the whole of western Europe. Been able to route their EU customer data to Athenry while avoiding Britain (post-Brexit) is important when it comes to EU data laws etc.

Leaving aside all that, I was been flippant about French Nuclear power. The French are second biggest builders of renewable power in Europe at the moment. For example in the year ending Q2 2017 they comissioned over 500MW of new solar power alone.

The proposed interconnector of course works both ways, if there is an excess of wind power been generated in Ireland it can be sold to continent over the interconnector, as a result it's presence also makes major wind-farms/grid-solar projects in Ireland more viable.

Bobeagleburger

Nuclear Power?

Seperate thread surely?

JRant

dubhthach wrote: »

Convert Moneypoint to Biomass would go along way to doing it. Of course there's also fact that there's something like 4GW of Solar in planning pipeline at the moment. ESB/Bord na Móna are for example in process of planning 570MW on cut away bogs. As long as they put in place some grid-scale batteries (like what Telsa have done in California, Hawaii and Samoa) it should help cover issues such as sunset

http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/esb-and-bord-na-mna-in-500m-solar-venture-to-power-150000-homes-35657227.html

I believe the ESB are quite proactive in this regard. From my understanding it is the plan to convert moneypoint within the next 10 years. It will cost a lot of money but processes are already in place to do this.

As you rightly say there is a lot if solar already in the pipeline, however it is taking a long time to get approval for these connection. It also needs to be understood that the old radial transmission network is slowly but surely being meshed to allow a more robust supply. One way or another we need to build a lot more 400kV network to get the power where it's needed. A 400kV is almost twice as efficient as a 220kV line.

There is talk off upgrading Poolbeg to 1GW, Great Island needs updating, Aghada is an extremely efficient plant run on gas, Moneypoint needs redevelopment for sure but we also need to start building new plants. One in the Midlands and another large one in the Galway region would ensure a much more robust supply.

Where does this tie into the data centres requirements? Well we need to transport power around the island as required but we also need a spinning reserve to maintain a baseline supply and frequency control. Data centres consume a fairly constant load so this also the generation plants to actually run at a far more efficient level, rather than ramping up and down.

I'm all for renewable technology, it is the way forward but we need to be careful about spending billions on it just for the sake of it. It needs to work and be effective/efficient or we end up paying now and then pay again in 3/4/5 years time.

Greaney

The locals had really been hoping that Apples investment in Athenry would include taking an interest in the locality like Iowa and invest in community groups etc.
https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2017/08/apples-next-us-data-center-will-be-built-in-iowa/

We do our deals differently in Ireland it appears

'We wouldn’t really expect the company to invest in the community,” Cllr Feeney said. “Apple’s investment is a form of community investment. There will be construction jobs and spin-off jobs, and rates paid to the local authority.”
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/delight-as-apple-decision-heralds-silicon-valley-of-west-of-ireland-1.3254139

oh, and by the way, when Apple submitted their affadavid in court, they said there were 'up to, 150 jobs' in the centre when it was fully built. It's the 'up to' that's so intriguing.

Revealed: Data centres to swallow 75pc of growth in Irish power demand

http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/revealed-data-centres-to-swallow-75pc-of-growth-in-irish-power-demand-36226058.html

Greaney

This LA Times journalist is clearly appalled by the tax breaks Iowa gave (over $200m), for a mere $100m of goodies for the local community.

http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-apple-iowa-20170825-story.html

What would he make of the Irish 'deal'?

what_traffic

Deleted User wrote: »

Revealed: Data centres to swallow 75pc of growth in Irish power demand

http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/revealed-data-centres-to-swallow-75pc-of-growth-in-irish-power-demand-36226058.html

This is an interesting line:
"At full capacity, the first phase of the plant will use some 30MW of power, the equivalent use of almost 26,000 homes. Over time, this will rise to 240MW."

So Athenry Apple plant if completely finished will be the equivalent of powering 208,000 homes?
Thats more electricity than all the households in Galway City and County combined.

fergiesfolly

what_traffic wrote: »

This is an interesting line:
"At full capacity, the first phase of the plant will use some 30MW of power, the equivalent use of almost 26,000 homes. Over time, this will rise to 240MW."

So Athenry Apple plant if completely finished will be the equivalent of powering 208,000 homes?
Thats more electricity than all the households in Galway City and County combined.

In 15 years time, if it gets that far.
I'm a bit on the fence about whether it should be built or not. But I'd be a lot happier if I saw a national plan where extra capacity is made available for all new electricity requirements, including the data centres.

_Puma_

I couldn't think of a worse use of the national grid capacity than Data centers. In the short term expect the PSO levy to keep increasing as we Import more Coal and Gas to meet the demand of these things coming online. Our EU emission targets are regressing and we are almost certain to be met with Large EU fines for not reaching the targets we set ourselves. The definition of incompetence.

dubhthach

Or more likely Apple will follow Microsoft example and buy electrical capacity from a renewable source. This will if anything result in more renewable been brought online (eg. supply and demand)

Microsoft has struck a deal with General Electric to buy all the electricity from a new wind farm in Ireland to power its cloud computing services — the latest example of multinational companies driving demand for renewable energy.

https://www.ft.com/content/5cdc0d78-ace2-11e7-aab9-abaa44b1e130

Of course the nice thing about the GE windfarm down in Kerry is that each turbine has a built in battery, combining renewable generation and grid-scale battery (like what Telsa have been doing in California) is the way ahead.