Owned by Green Mountain, OSL-Hamar is located in Hamar, Norway and places a strong focus on sustainability and renewable energy.
Critically, the facility is designed to house significant computing power, whilst also being highly energy efficient to minimise environmental impact. Alongside using 100% renewable hydropower, the site notably features state-of-the-art infrastructure, Green Mountain says, which includes multiple buildings with significant IT power capacity.
The facility is also built to high security and reliability standards. With a possible footprint of up to 1.5 million square feet, the campus has the potential to house five buildings, each with a capacity of 30 megawatts (MW).
The sustainable data centre potential Green Mountain says the initial three buildings on site are now complete and operational.
The site is being built and operated according to Green Mountain’s high sustainability standards. This includes significant renewable power use, world-leading energy efficiency, whilst also preparing for heat reuse.
OSL-Hamar key statistics:
– 18000 m2 of IT space in existing buildings
– 12000 IT space in planned buildings
– 150 MW Total Site Capacity
– 1.2 Average PUE
Significantly, TikTok – the data centre company’s customer – has secured a contract for three buildings within OSL-Hamar, using the entire 90MW capacity.
OSL-Hamar is supporting TikTok with its increasing data storage needs in Europe in particular. The social media platform retains the option to expand its capacity to 150MW, according to Green Mountain, with its current planned capacity at site being fully committed.
“The Hamar region is an ideal location for our data centres. Here, they have a surplus of renewable power, pre-zoned land areas and a competent workforce,” Green Mountain CEO Svein Atle Hagaseth said, when the compnay’s TikTok data centre deal was announced.
“This is the first hyperscale data centre of this scale in Norway and we are grateful for TikTok’s vote of confidence in the project. The site will become a true example of our vision of setting the green standard.”
Pioneering “free cooling”Alongside expansion efforts, Green Mountain is currently engaging with industry and research initiatives that can benefit from the residual heat produced by the OSL-Hamar data centres.
The campus harnesses the benefits of the natural Norwegian air to cool its colocation data centre at Hamar. The average temperature in the area is 5.8°C, with July being the hottest month of the year with an average temperature of 16.8°C.
Green Mountain operates with a range of cooling technologies to support its data centre services, including fjord cooling and air cooling. The company uses the natural conditions of a wet and cold climate to cool its data centres by using “free cooling” from indirect air or its unique fjord cooling solution to achieve both higher efficiency and cost reductions.
In addition to Hamar, Green Mountain operates data centres in Rjukan and Rennesøy in Norway. The company says these regions have benefitted from job creation and increasing economic activity as a result, as it seeks to prove that data centres can help to boost local economies.
Data centres require access to power grids, strong fibre networks and skilled workforces. In addition to sourcing goods and services from regional suppliers, Green Mountain has also generated employment during data centre construction and operation.
A new chapter for the Nordic data centre market? The Nordic data centre market continues to boom, as technology giants are increasingly drawn to good government incentives, tax benefits and an abundance of renewable energy.
Particularly across Europe, reliance on digital infrastructure is growing and continues to attract cloud services providers from the US to establish a greater Nordic presence.
For Green Mountain, its growth success in the data centre industry can be attributed to continued expansion efforts and a strong focus on sustainability and innovative solutions. Its ethos in Norway extends across its entire portfolio, suggesting a strong and ambitious growth plan across the continent.
“With OSL-Hamar, Green Mountain is proud to operate the largest colocation data centre in Europe,” says Svein Atle Hagaseth, EVP & global chief business officer at Green Mountain.
“We’ve built a facility that sets a new standard for secure, sustainable and large-scale digital infrastructure in the region. This project has been made possible through an excellent partnership with our client, TikTok.”
All images courtesy of Green Mountain
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