HiCloud Launches World's First Commercial Underwater Data Center Powered by Offshore Wind Energy

The Chinese technology firm HiCloud has announced the deployment of the world’s first commercially operational underwater data center (UDC) that draws its power directly from an adjacent offshore wind farm. This landmark achievement represents a significant leap forward in the development of sustainable digital infrastructure, successfully leveraging natural resources to meet the growing global demand for computing capacity.

The facility is strategically positioned off the coast of Shanghai, near the Lingang Special Free Trade Zone. This placement underscores the region's commitment to merging maritime, digital, and new energy economies. The initial demonstration unit, slated to be fully operational by September 2025, boasts a starting capacity of 2.3 megawatts (MW). This initial phase is crucial for system calibration and testing before the subsequent full-scale rollout.

The second phase of the project is ambitious, planning to scale the capacity up significantly to 24 MW, which will be entirely sustained by renewable energy sources. A core advantage of this submerged design is the utilization of natural seawater for cooling purposes. HiCloud estimates that this method delivers energy savings of between 30% and 40% when compared to conventional land-based data centers.

The substantial reduction in cooling requirements is key to the system's overall efficiency. While the energy consumed by cooling systems typically accounts for 40–50% of total consumption in traditional centers, in the HiCloud UDC, this figure drops dramatically to less than 10%. Consequently, the demonstration facility reports a highly efficient Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE) rating below 1.15, which surpasses current national standards established in China.

HiCloud is investing approximately 1.6 billion yuan into the current Shanghai project. They designate this as an advanced Version 2.0 because of its direct integration with wind generation, enabling the system to achieve over 90% clean energy supply. This current development builds upon HiCloud's prior experimental work, including the launch of a test module off the coast of Hainan in 2021 and the introduction of the first commercial prototype in 2023.

Unlike earlier pilot studies, such as Microsoft’s Project Natick, HiCloud is actively transitioning toward full commercial implementation. This effort is being executed in collaboration with the Lingang Administrative Committee and the Shanghai Lingang Special Area Investment Holding Group Co., Ltd. Beyond the significant resource conservation—including the complete elimination of freshwater consumption and a reduction in land use exceeding 90%—the submerged cluster is engineered to support demanding workloads related to artificial intelligence (AI), 5G networks, industrial Internet of Things (IoT), and cross-border data transmission. This initiative is positioned as a tangible manifestation of a new technological paradigm, seamlessly integrating with natural systems to boost productivity while drastically minimizing the environmental footprint.