Shearwater GeoServices runs Nvidia GPUs to process high quality sensor image and seismic data analysis obtained with a fleet of marine vessels. At $50,000 for a single GPU and multiples of those GPUs in its data center compute workload, the company has been forced to clamp down on costs, especially the cost of energy.
Its solution has been to migrate from the UK to a relatively new data center in Iceland run by atNorth, which has operations in other Nordic countries. The result: the company has publicly said it has seen an 85% reduction in power costs in Iceland, while gaining the added benefit of a greater than 90% carbon reduction.
“In the UK, we had rolling blackouts, so how are you going to continue? We started to panic,” said Andrew Brunton, processing and imaging manager for Shearwater in a presentation on Oct. 24 at the Data Center Forum in Reykjavic.
He posted a slide showing his company was forecasting it would spend $210,000 next March alone for data center operations in the UK, compared to $17,000 for the same month in Iceland. The company is also expecting its carbon footprint to decline, from 363 tons of CO2 in the UK to nearly 30 tons in Iceland.
In an interview, Brunton said he is paying upwards of $50,000 per Nvidia GPU with 200 needed for the company’s elaborate seismic analysis. “We’re a high user of Nvidia but it’s good for us.”
The Iceland provider, atNorth, joined another Iceland-based provider, Borealis Data Center, in presentations at the forum extolling the low-cost energy and sustainability advantages of working in Iceland. With Amsterdan placing a moratorium on data center growth, and insufficient energy in Dublin to allow approvals of more data centers, the Iceland providers are expecting more business from there and elsewhere.
In addition to low energy costs with Iceland’s plentiful geothermal and hydro power, the country boasts a company, ON Power, that has a subsidiary depositing captured CO2 into the ground.
Iceland also benefits from a new submarine fiber optic connection to Dublin called IRIS, which first came online in March.
Operated by Farice, the IRIS fiber optic install was financed by the government of Iceland at a cost of $50 million. It joins two previous fiber connections to nearby countries, adding resiliency to the network that outside companies insist on having.
Borealis and atNorth conducted tours of their data center facilities for reporters after the forum in the towns of Blonduos and Akureyri, respectively. Borealis CEO Bjorn Brynjulfsson also wears another hat as chairman of Data Centers by Iceland.
In addition the its three campuses in Iceland, Borealis announced in July a collaboration with IBM Denmark to offer Danish companies a sustainable data center solution for storing and processing data in Iceland, which the company deemed relevant for organizations requiring high-energy use for large-data processing. The tie to IBM gives Borealis the opportunity to expand its business with global companies.
For the region near Blonduos, the Borealis data center is a welcome addition, creating about 10 jobs for locals and the potential for more growth. “We’re excited the data center is looking to AI to enhance business,” said Petur Arason, a career engineer who is also mayor of the community surrounding Blondus.
A feature of Blonduos is that area is “safe…with no active volcanos and earthquakes,” the mayor added While tourists are often surprised the island nation has volcanos and earthquakes, they have come to be a way of life for Iceland’s 400,000 residents.
Much of Iceland experiences minor earthquakes, sometimes hundreds a day, and has four active volcanoes, including Fagradalsfjall, which erupted In 2022 for about three weeks without causing injuries.
The miracle of Iceland’s volcanos and earthquakes is that they activate the rocks under the volcanic soil causing chemical reactions and sending boiling water upward to the surface through fissures. That hot water is a godsend to Iceland, which uses it to heat buildings with a series of pipes while steam off the water is used to turn turbines and electric generators for power.
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