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Updated at 2pm
APPLE IS BUILDING its first data centres outside the US… and has chosen Athenry, Galway as one of the locations.
The €1.7 billion investment will also see a data centre constructed in Denmark’s central Jutland.
They will both power Apple’s online services, including the iTunes Store, the App Store, iMessage, Maps and Siri for European customers.
The 166,000-sq-metre centre will be built on a Coillte-owned greenfield site at Derrydonnell. According to IDA Ireland, the two state agencies worked together “on providing a property solution to secure the Apple investment announced today”.
Apple says it is recovering land previously used for growing and harvesting non-native trees. It has promised to restore native trees to the forest and power the centres with 100% renewable energy.
“The project will also provide an outdoor education space for local schools, as well as a walking trail for the community,” it said in the statement.
CEO Tim Cook said it was the biggest project in Europe to date, adding that hundreds of jobs will be created.
IDA Ireland believes there will be 300 jobs provided throughout the multiple phases of the project.
The announcement has been welcomed by Taoiseach Enda Kenny. ”It is a very significant investment in the West of Ireland and is fantastic news for Athenry with significant knock-on benefits for the region,” he said this morning.
At an event in Dublin this afternoon, he said he said he had had two “very positive meetings” with Cook – in Cork and in California.
He said those meetings had been an ideal opportunity to stress “the opportunities that exist for that kind of development here in Ireland”.
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That’s some investment,I hope everybody gets a bit of that Apple in galway
Great News, the cool wet climate in Galway is good for something.
It won’t be so lonely around the fields of Athenry anymore
its referred to as ‘The green fields of Athenry’ now
Great news for the west.
Very positive news in fairness..well done to all that brought it about.
Yes, fantastic news and good to see it go outside of the capital – what an investment. The world’s biggest company commited to Ireland. Awesome.
Great news!
The domino effect for the local economy from this Apple investment will be significant!
Great joined-up thinking by our Government Agencies to deliver the land for this project.
Apparently, 1m + sq ft facility will consume as much power per annum as Galway City’s current requirement.
Hope a secure renewable local source can be found – AD maybe.
Yes absolutely fantastic news. Delighted well done IDA for bringing this one over the line.
Truely shows we are in full recovery mode. Other part of country still need to feel it too
Great news for Athenry and Ireland…. well done IDA.
Yes, entire plant will be powered by biogas converted to bio methane.. We just need to built a about 100 or so
We have Apple’s Europe, Middle East and Africa Headquarters. Soon to have the first datacenter outside the US. But still no Apple Store.
that is still a strange one, and resellers aren’t apple stores. theres a certain store in the city there i’d never bring a machine to again.
100 operations jobs once the Data Center is built and ready to go supposedly. Given the size and the 24×7 nature of the work this number sounds about right. You’ll have a spilt day/night shift etc.
At least it might mean that the local power and bandwidth grids are upgraded to state of the art. Now that would help the local economy.
Badly needed in that part of the country, neglected for far too long. Hope they’re made keep that promise of restoring the forests as well.
You need to get out more and visit other parts of the country if you think Galway is/ was neglected.
I meant the west in general, this will affect far more counties than just Galway.
Good job Dylan, turn a good news story into an us against them story. Have you been to Summerhill or Darndale recently?
There are far more opportunities in the relative locality of Summerhill and Darndale for those willing to look for them, then in some parts of the West, North-West of the country, swathes of which are absolutely devoid of job opportunities.
I say that as a Dub.
Darndale Says No are still in bed.
Well said Scipio, rural areas are being depopulated and job opportunities are just as you described.
Luke how am I making this an us against them story? Im rightly pointing out that there are areas in this country that have been completely left behind by successive governments, and announcements like these are good for those areas such as most of the west. It would be a great day if Apple opened a data centre in Darndale too, nobodies taking that away from you…
That’s fgs area in next election after this
I hope Apple sponsor Connacht rugby!
Just another knock on effect of this fantastic investment. I too would love to see apple sponsor connacht it would be tremendous
Head office been in Munster … I dont think so ;)
A very strategic location just of the M6 Motorway fro east to west and right beside the new interchange on the north/south M18/M17 motorway which has just commenced in recent days.
in this case grid access is more important than road
I’d imagine these data centres consume a huge amount of water for cooling purposes, so perhaps that’s why somewhere near the Shannon gets the nod over Dublin and the east coast.
It would be interesting to find out just how much water the new plant will need and where the waste heat will be dumped.
Not particularly, one reason why large data centers are been built in Ireland is due to ambient air temperature. You can make a large saving on air conditioning costs by using the outside ambient air temperature.
What’s interesting about this project is it’s first time a large scale Data Center has been built outside of Dublin region.
Athenry has number of things going for it such as:
Good Grid connection
Lots of Fibre in the vicinity (BT/CIÉ, ESB, E-NET, dark fibre in the M6, Bord Gáis Fibre)
There’s also proposal to land a transatlantic cable up in Mayo (which would hook of the Bord Gáis/M6 dark fibre) presence of a major data center on proposed route make it more viable option.
Waste heat? Can it be used to generate power?
Not sure why there’s a negative reaction to my comment, but I’d have figured that the design, given that it’s a large air conditioned facility, will involve substantial amounts of water.
It not near the shannon
I would think they picked it because it is a bog and hence they can use the cold water for cooling
Cold winds in a damp region reduces costs.
Brian, check out free cooling and evap cooling systems, cheap and cheerful considering the conditions we live in, there’s minimal waste pending on water quality.
@Brian the technology is known as “fresh air cooling” and doesn’t need any water. Just needs the air to be de-humidified but costs for cooling are drastically reduced. Also ESB grid isn’t as loaded as Dublin so more capacity energy wise.
Also another reason west of ireland location is latency for USA based clients. No big deal for itunes but for stocks & shares proximity can save milliseconds has the potential to save millions in the world of automated sells. INEX gave a presentation on it recently with fibre coming ashore with the Corrib Gas project piggybacking the planning and eis.
There’ll be many more datacentres in the Wesht…watch this space.
The water is simply put back where it came from… YouTube Hamina data center!
Centre.
Brian, they won’t use water for cooling. More than likely a free air system will be used
Factory will be powered from bio methane and they will use tri generation , or other wise know as cchp (big gas engine, that turns a generator, creating electricity and the converting excess thermal energy into cooling via an absorption chiller) natural gas will be the constant then over time as Biomethane become common that will replace gas.. Bord Gais are behind it..
It is good news but I think some of the commentators here are getting a bit too excited. Similar Apple data centres in the US need circa 50 employees to run these giant centres, while needing huge amounts of energy. Data centres don’t create lots of jobs, and if they are going to use all renewable energy east Galway us going to see s lot more turbines.
Give it up and get a life way to much time on your hands.
Will they not be just burning all the trees around them for the energy? And put up a turbine or two for show.
Pat Mustard is 100% correct ;)
Eamon get informed before writing your crap, you obviously have no clue what a data centre is, and what manpower is required for these giant centres. Have a read of this, it might open your eyes, as well as some of the other commentators who think this will have a knock on effect for the whole west. There will be jobs during construction but thats about it.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/cloud-centers-bring-high-tech-flash-but-not-many-jobs-to-beaten-down-towns/2011/11/08/gIQAccTQtN_story.html
You’re spot on sir, I mean, there will be some short term rewards or whatever, but yep, 50 jobs or so is what you’re talking about after 5 years. Ireland has an ideal climate for these data centres, and the West needs every job it can get, so this is good news. =)
Mr Mustard is correct. I am a former chief operating engineer in a large data center in the US.
I think apple is trying to keep its data out of the snoopy eyes of US Intelligence agencies.
Still, a good deal for Athenry.
Never said it would have a knock on for the whole west.
Its a boost in tax for Galway co co and it will employ about 300 full time.
It will create a huge amount of jobs during construction which will help create more cash flow in the area and bring some more people into Galway and surround towns for the few years it takes to build. They will then need 50-100 people operating this data plant so that’s an extra 100 jobs we didn’t have yesterday. Hopefully this will have a knock on affect and more IT companies will see Ireland as a good location for data plants. Why must you be so negative the minute something good is announced they didn’t say APPLE BUILDS DATA PLANT – IRELAND UNEMPLOYMENT RATE 0%
It would be great to see Apple source as much of the material for the data center in Ireland, but with the taxes on purchases, that’s not likely.
According to the announcement it will create only a couple of hundred jobs, many of which will only last for the duration of the construction. Have I missed something?
Seamus, the thought had occurred to me but I’m not sure the Microsoft debacle over the same issue has been settled. Still good to see some investment in the area.
@ Pat – well, seeing as they’re building beside a Wind Turbine factory, what’s the problem ?
Wrong – Not even 1MW will be powered by renewables
good to see a big investment going out west.
estimates say 300 construction jobs which is a big chunk.
after that it will be 50-75 staff to run the place.
plenty knock on jobs as well as infrastructure will need to be built to provide the 100% renewable energy target.
the reason it’s being built out there is also the same reason Blacknight built the Data Center in Carlow, Ireland has really good weather conditions for this type of infrastructure as it doesn’t get to warm or cold so heating\cooling can be done passively which is a massive energy saving for a Data Center.
CENTRE
it is not been powered on renewables
congrats to the ida
And the government. It this story said “job looses in Galway” everyone would be on there for a good aul moan about the useless Government.
Great news alright, but Data Centers do not require all that much staff, so competition will be tough.
Great news for Lenovo or HP.
Not really. When you build at that scale, you skip the OEMs and go straight to the OEMs in east Asia. Everything is custom specced and built. And as for “hundreds of jobs”, pah! That’ll be temporary construction work. A modern data centre requires: disk monkeys, security, and operators to check the temperature. All advanced work is done remotely from HQ. Maybe there’ll be 20 full time staff on shift work, all on the lower end of salaries.
and i begrudge those 20 their jobs.
I work on a data centre in Finland, believe me no one will be on less than €60,000
Thats great news.!
A high tech giant arriving from America.
No doubt they will receive generous grants and pay little or no tax-as usual.
I presume the small er.. problem, of Cryptosporidium in the local drinking water there, has been resolved-for good.!
if not,sure, then Irish Water can make the employees take the hit for a new treatment plant, and laying new pipelines
So you’d prefer the jobs and infrastructure to go elsewhere? That’s not very patriotic
And the prize for mentioning Irish water in a completely unrelated story goes to ………
Also how much in payroll taxes will be raised on 350 jobs! Also it is great to see jobs like this being created west of the Shannon.
There won’t be 350 jobs created by this project. The center will only hire 50-75 people long-term.
50 – 75 more than they have now I suppose.
Always good to keep the hunger strikers in the news..
just to say, this is proposed to be powered by 100% renewable energy.
i.e. wind energy
Use the SF/IRA supporters. They are full of wind!
No not necessarily, there are other renewables. When they say 100% renewable it doesn’t mean that the actual electricity used there will be from renewables. If the plant annually uses 1GWH. They could offset this by generating 1GWH some where else via Biomass, PV, hydro etc
there are other renewables, in theory
More than just theory. As stated they could be any where and include PV , biomass , hydro. ( the three dam gorge is much more than just theory)
The Three Gorges Dam, the Hoover Dam and Ardnacrusha are only theoretical, Brian. They have yet to be tested…
Not 1MW is been powered by renewables
This is very misleading
Owen that’s a silly comment. apple are going to offset the energy used, do for every 1MWH used they will generate 1MWH.
You don’t use MW you use MWH.
Brian, Is the plant been powered or not by renewables ??
Yes it will be grid fed so without apple doing anything it’ll be 20% renewable. As Apple are going to build renewable generation then no additional fossil fuels will be used to power the data centre.
You obviously have no idea how energy systems work
I can guarantee you Brian that I have a better understanding than you of the electricity system in Ireland.
Now, please explain how building renewable generation will lead to no fossil fuels been used to power the data centre ? Do they intend splitting the grid power into baseload and renewable plant when it arrives in their centre ?
This is one hell of hoax. Apple love fossil fuel powered reliable synchronous grid power at 50Hz just like all the rest of us.
Owen you seem to lack the basic understanding of how offsetting works. Apple are going to match whatever is used by the data Center with the same amount of renewable energy. Now it may not be in ireland as climate control is a global issue. So the end result is that it if the data Center consumes 100GWH it will be responsibly for generating 100GW of energy through renewables
So they are going to use 100GWH of mainly dispatchable plant fueled power but are going to generate 100GWH of non dispatchable generation which is neither gauranteed nor of much use to anyone.
You need to understand the difference between dispatchable and non dispatchable power.
Offsetting dispatchable power with non-dispatch is a con.
What makes you think that they are going to use non dispatchable renewable power? There are dispatchable renewable technologies hydro, biomass etc.
You seem to have a chip on your shoulder. Or a preset agenda.
OK well at least now we are getting somewhere.
So Apple are going to invest in hydro or biomass. Well that is a completely different story. Lets see how that pans out because IWEA were on RTE raving about Apple but they are not in favor of large scale biomass.
I fully agree btw that there are renewables that are dispatchable but our present government is only in favor of non dispatch
Owen, the IWEA are a vested interest group who love to talk things up. As I said previously climate change is a global issue and the renewable energy could come from plants outside Ireland. The IWEA won’t have a say.
Hey guys, it’s gonna be powered from cchp combined cooling heating power units using natural gas a first, then Biomethane plants will be built all around Ireland and inject the “renewable energy” into the gas network. Apple can claim that they are using renewable gas from Biomethane.. Hope that help:)
That’s interesting, I can’t imagine that there is enough bio methane available in the country to power a plant of roughly 300 MW. Transporting the required amount could be CO2 heavy.
Right now there are zero bio methane plants, but 20 plants are ready to start, Bord Gais have big plans, bio methane will also be used for transport fleets shortly, government I hope will soon announce tarrifs to support biogas/bio methane.. Let’s see what happens, but Apple and other huge companies have only signed up for these projects if they are powered via renewable, forget about wind, biogas is Ireland best resource due to the fact it can sort out electrical, thermal, cooling and transport needs, I know because I work for a company who has 350 plants around the world:)
It won’t be lonely so
Wifi in the fields of Athenry..
The Field of Wifiry
More bad news. What if these jobs go to highly skilled people? What will SFIRA supporters do then?
Can they just open an official Apple Store now, long overdue for another location besides Belfast
but apple are supposed to be evil :D
lefties are going to hate this :D
They don’t hate this, they just hate the bit about the sweat shops at the other side of the world that have to be fenced off to keep worker-suicides to a minimum.
If that is their goal/interest what are they doing here? surely they can’t assist from here so why haven’t they left? oh yea that right they are lefties therefore just all talk.
People bitching about the amount of long term jobs really bugs me. Can you not be happy that some jobs are being created. 60 – 70 long term positions are a lot better than none. Short term construction jobs, a lot better than none. Steel fabrication, cement / building materials, landscaping, security, local delis / petrol stations to be used by builders, Construction / future business visitors staying in hotels and B and B’s, pubs and restaurants being used. The amount of knock on work and money spent in the local vicinity will be immense even if it’s short lived. It still better than none.
High paid ones too…
Great news for jobs but Apple doesn’t exist anywhere so its not exactly going to pay much tax here. Its a good and bad headline!
If Apple is not going to exist, I’d rather they not exist here rather than some other country.
More evidence of Fine Gael and their cosy relationship with the Global Elite to create jobs for no other reason than election propaganda.
Enda Kenny has tricked large foreign firms into investing in the Irish Recovery Story he has been incessantly peddling around the globe.
Sinn Fein, the party of Truth, when in Government, will correct these lies and announce to the world that the country is on its knees and might default at any moment.
well done to all concerned
Never mind the “fields” what about restoring the walls, which are the most complete Norman town walls in Ireland?
No they are not. Fethard in Co Tipperary has the most complete town walls.
I’d love to know what their Local Authority Rates bill is being politically reduced to. That’s a lot of Sq ft.
Lol…I actually posted my earlier sarcasm without seeing Pat Mustard’s comment. Roflmao.
It is a good thing that ANY jobs come West of the Shannon.Since this government was elected it has been forgotton about.Every village in the west has seen the cream of their youth, the hope for the future forced to emigrate because there were no jobs anymore.MBNA in Leitrim, and not forgotting Roscommon A&E where an €8 million facility was closed transferring service 90k away to an overcrowded Galway.So yes it is good news but just wondered if the announcement was timed to catch FG Ard Feis?? Cynical maybe but do you blame me?
It is good news that any job are created west of the Shannon.
Sine the last election the very best of our young people have been forced to emigrate in their droves and there is not a village that has not lost lots of its people. MBNA closed in Leitrim,and dont forget an A&E that cost €8million was swiftly closed just after FG got elected even though it was promised that it would remain open. So yes the west has been forgotton about and it will probably take generations for any sort of prosperity to come back.I just wondered if this announcement of Apples. Investment was timed to coincide with the Ard Feis in Castlebar,am I a bit cynical? What do you think?
surely they would have announced it at the same time – not 2 days after? I know the government can be incompetent – but surely the spin doctors have calendars?
Must be an election coming….
Are apple running a candidate?!
Why was this announced the same time as Kennys Ard Feis?…..am I being cynical?……
I hope this doesn’t increase FG’s core vote.
iCant see too many jobs coming from this.
me neither, construction first then that will be it. they’ll use more energy than the cost of keeping a dozen staff. it might lead to other things though.
100 operations jobs once the Data Center is built and ready to go supposedly. Given the size and the 24×7 nature of the work this number sounds about right. You’ll have a spilt day/night shift etc.
& for everyone complaining about the weather (me included). Our climate actually plays a big part in the likes of apple and microsoft basing their data centres here.
Any chance of building an actual apple store?
I live in Athenry, and I hope that the local community get to feel the benefits of this fantastic news.
And not even an apple shop in Ireland. Get that
This can be powered by the smugness of apple users.
Great news for the west though
Wats the bets its going to be an eye sore
It’ll be a big grey box, like any other factory..
Heh,
Looks like this councillor got his cloud computing alright….
http://www.herald.ie/news/feckin-eejit-cloud-row-just-an-elaborate-hoax-27995022.html
xD
Any job created is great news. Just a shame that the number of permanent positions for such a large centre are so low.
Me thinks Enda and Joan overestimated the impact this would make when they said there would be no unemployment by 2018
Will they pay the effective full corporation tax rate? Apple investing in Ireland is just a tax dodging scheme.
“APPLE IS BUILDING its first data centres, ” So what do these data centres do or keep?
Great news specifically for the West but also Ireland as a whole, for corporate confidence etc. Wonder if there is any link with U2 and their reported work with IDA and obviously Apple. Ok we will have to wait for FOI. . .
I
Jobs for locals or foreign imports like what Valeo have done in tuam. We do want jobs like.
Not 1MW is been powered by renewables
This is a very misleading article
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