China Launches 2,000-Server Underwater Data Centre Off Shanghai

China has officially taken its first commercial underwater data centre into operation off the coast of Shanghai, a 24MW facility that houses roughly 2,000 servers in pressure‑resistant modules. The servers are cooled by seawater and receive power directly from a nearby offshore wind farm, achieving a power‑usage effectiveness (PUE) of under 1.15 and eliminating the need for freshwater. The Lingang facility claims zero freshwater consumption and a highly efficient energy profile. The project follows Microsoft’s 2018 Project Natick, which deployed 855 servers off Orkney and recorded a one‑eighth failure rate compared to land‑based servers, but was later discontinued. The new Chinese centre marks a significant step forward for submerged data‑centre technology and could set a new standard for sustainable, high‑density computing infrastructure.