SOLOR POWER COULD BE USED AT APPLE'S NORTH CAROLINA DATA CENTER

Apple’s massive billion-dollar North Carolina data center, which received a failing rating in a Greenpeace report earlier this year, may soon be powered by a solar farm. The Charlotte Observer recently uncovered permit plans from North Carolina’s Catawba County that show Apple’s intentions to adjust the terrain on a 171-acre plot across from its data center. The plans are titled “Project Dolphin Solar Farm A Expanded” but they do not discuss the solar farm itself. Instead, they detail roads, erosion control and a strategy to avoid disturbing local streams and the local environment with construction work. Apple has yet to apply for a building permit for the site, but more information will likely be revealed if it does. This is not Apple’s first foray into eco-friendly power; its facilities in Austin, Texas; Sacramento, California; and Cork, Ireland already run on 100% renewable energy. The Cupertino-based company currently relies on coal and nuclear power from Duke Energy to run its North Carolina data center.

APPLE HIRES MICROSOFT DATA CENTER GURU; iTUNES IN THE CLOUD?

Apple has hired Kevin Timmons away from Microsoft, where he was general manager of Microsoft’s data centers. Not only that, but Timmons apparently was directly responsible for rolling out Microsoft’s cloud and data presence at 50% of the cost estimated by other managers, while maintaining peak efficiency.

Last year, Apple’s Steve Jobs dismissed Cupertino’s ambitions to bring iTunes to the cloud, saying that they still thought that downloads and not streaming were the cornerstone of digital media.

Even at the time, everyone knew he was being disingenuous: Apple had recently built a massive North Carolina data center for unknown purposes, and services like Netflix and Spotify have amply proven that a la carte streaming is what consumers actually want.

Still, Apple’s total hegemony over the music industry is based off the concept of downloads; take away the idea that users need to pay a buck to download an MP3, and Apple’s iTunes empire falls.

What Jobs was doing was attempting to buy some more time. Apple will bring iTunes to the cloud, but it needs to do so while retaining the core iTunes business, which is downloads. This means cloud locker storage, such as Amazon just introduced with Cloud Locker… and if rumors are anything to go by, we’ll see Apple roll out just that sort of product in the next few months.

But maybe Apple has something even bigger up its sleeve? The evidence is certainly mounting that Apple intends to make a massive cloud-based push that is far, far bigger than just a cloud-based music locker.

Rumor has it that Apple’s North Carolina data center isn’t the only data center Apple is setting up. In fact, rumors are circulating that Apple is setting up data centers both nationally and abroad. If these are true, Timmons’ hire likely represents a huge push into the cloud on Apple’s part… and if history is anything to go by, the repercussions of that will likely be market shaking.

FACEBOOK TO BUILD MASSIVE DATA CENTER IN NORTH CAROLINA

North Carolina sure is proving popular with tech companies looking to set up huge data centers. First Apple built itself a huge data facility there, which is rumored to be the backbone to their ambitions for bringing iTunes to the cloud… but now Facebook is entering the state to build a new, top-of-the-line data center in Forest City, North Carolina.

“This project continues Facebook’s strategy of moving from leased data centers to owned facilities that are customized to be more cost-effective and efficient,” Barry Schnitt, a Facebook spokesman, wrote on the social network’s official site.

According to North Carolina Governor Bev Persue, the facility will cost about $450 million to build, and the construction will create 250 jobs during its 18-month building phase; one it’s completed, it will then employ between 35 and 45 full time and contract workers.

This isn’t the first new data facility the information hungry social network has built recently. They previously began building a facility in Prineville, Oregon, which is scheduled to open up next year, albeit amongst some controversy: the facility will be getting its electricity largely from coal. That’s an environmental no-no these days, but Facebook has argued (rather lamely) that the design of the facility is efficient enough that it would offset the environmental use of coal.

That’s hard to believe, but either way, the new North Carolina facility won’t be subject to the same criticisms: it’s coal use is well within line with the national average, and the use of clean nuclear power is 39 percent, which is about double the national average. If North Carolina’s clean enough for eco-friendly Apple, it ought to be clean enough for Facebook. [Geek]