Power-Hungry Data Centers Bypassing Oregon Town

Constructing a data center at Pendleton, Ore., seems to be more of a dream than a reality. Economic developers in the eastern Oregon town of Pendleton are toying with the idea of developing the city's industrial park as the town has enough capacity for developments.

However, with power being a constraint, construction of data centers is proving to be difficult as data centers consume huge amounts of power and generate a great deal of heat as the numerous computer servers process information.

A couple of years ago, a high tech company that wanted to move a data processing center to the city's industrial park couldn't do so as the tab for more electrical capacity was $15 million and no deal could be struck to pay for it. The project didn't find a home.

Prineville was luckier in that Facebook chose the economically depressed Central Oregon town for the construction of its first company-owned data center. What was attractive about Prineville was the reliable and affordable power, a dry climate that uses an evaporative cooling system that kept power costs down and, above all, the tax breaks Facebook (News - Alert) received.

Will Pendleton find a savior like Prineville did? If it does, then the data center could actually materialize.