Microsoft Dives Deep with Underwater Data Center Experiment

Microsoft conducted an experiment to test whether data centers could operate reliably underwater using seawater as part of the cooling system. In 2018, they lowered a sealed cylindrical vessel containing 864 servers into the North Sea off Scotland's Orkney Islands.

The 40-foot-long vessel was placed about 117 feet below the surface as part of Project Natick. The sealed vessel was filled with nitrogen rather than ordinary air, which created an environment with less oxygen and therefore less potential for corrosion inside the enclosure.

Cooling was one of the central engineering reasons for putting the equipment underwater. The system transferred heat to the surrounding seawater instead of relying on conventional cooling infrastructure used by land-based facilities.

The underwater servers had a failure rate one-eighth that of the land-based control group, which suggested that the controlled environment inside the vessel had produced more reliable operation than conventional conditions.