Two Lerwick sites – at Black Hill Industrial Estate and Port Business Park - are currently being considered for the data centre location.
The Shetland climate is one of the coolest and most stable in the UK and the data centre facility will have one of the smallest ‘energy footprints’ in the world. With carbon taxation regimes under development across Europe and beyond, minimisation of IT related carbon footprints is a growing concern for data centre customers and the Shetland data centre will offer both corporate and public sector clients real advantages in reducing their carbon liabilities.
A recent Greenpeace report, entitled ‘Make IT Green’, identified challenges for data centres in the future and urged developers and operators to switch to renewable energy sources.
It is proposed that excess heat generated by the 4 Megawatt data centre be fed in to Lerwick’s district heating scheme to allow it to expand and satisfy a backlog of demand.
Feasibility work is currently being undertaken into heating scheme integration, as well as the possibility of delivering up to 100 Mbps (megabits per second) ‘fibre to the premises’ (FTTP) to heating system subscribers to bring high speed connectivity to businesses and homes within the community.
Having recently secured a long term future for Shetland’s oil and gas industry Shetland Islands Council is keen to see the island established as a credible player within the emerging digital economy, which both UK and Scottish Governments recognise as being fundamental to thriving communities, business growth and prosperity.
Data centre provision in the UK is almost at capacity and the requirement for modern top-end technology data centres is a major area of growth.
It is proposed that the £12 million project will act as a springboard to help further exploit Shetland’s leading position in wind energy, hydrogen technologies and community heating as well as providing the first large scale use for the SHEFA-2 high-speed fibre optic telecommunication link between the Northern Isles and the mainland of Scotland.
Once up and running, the data centre will provide a handful of direct jobs but could lead to hundreds more in the longer term as businesses, home workers and other organisations choose to take advantage of the services it will offer.
Josie Simpson, Chair of the Council’s Development Committee said, "The Council is very excited and fully committed to the development of the proposed data centre. Our long term ambitions for Shetland include the establishment and ongoing development of a new digital industry for the island and the collaboration with Alchemy Plus is a key milestone towards achieving this. We intend to utilise the data centre ourselves, not just to benefit from the financial and operational benefits that such a shared services facility can deliver, but also to ensure that we fully showcase the strengths of the facility to both local and international customers."
Neil Grant, Head of Economic Development for Shetland Islands Council said, "This is a truly unique project further advancing Shetland’s leading position in wind and hydrogen energy and firmly establishing us as a world class player within the emerging digital economy. It is very satisfying to see such a multi-faceted project benefit from our past and ongoing commitment to delivering high capacity fibre optic internet connectivity, our innovative district heating scheme and our acclaimed local renewables expertise. The data centre is a real catalyst connecting so many key components of our development plan for the future. As an island we may be disadvantaged by location and transport costs, however, within the digital sphere these constraints do not apply and our climate and green energy credentials position us very well within a growing international market for data services."
Steve Chisholm, Chief Executive Officer of Alchemy Plus, said: "We are looking forward to working closely with Shetland Islands Council over coming months to progress this joint initiative and bring our plans to fruition. Rarely have I dealt with an organisation as focused on development and as progressive in its thinking as Shetland Islands Council and we feel extremely privileged that they have selected us as their preferred development partner for such a world class opportunity. While many existing and aspiring data centre operators make claims about the "green" credentials of their facilities I truly believe that the Shetland facility will be among the most environmentally sympathetic in the world. Without question this development puts Shetland on the world map for any client genuinely committed to protection of the environment."
Peter Swanson, Chairman of Alchemy Plus, added: "This is good news for both parties. The net effect of such innovative energy management will be to ensure a highly cost effective offering - i.e. green and at less cost. As we migrate towards becoming a fully established data centres operator, issues such as energy conservation and carbon taxation are becoming major considerations for both operators and clients. This  will underpin the  establishment of a new global industry not just for the island, but as part of a multi-facility development, for the whole Highlands and Islands and North East of Scotland."
The Highland Council yesterday advised that planning consent has been given for Alchemy Plus's Inverness harbour facility. The company is also close to formally securing a further development site in Aberdeen to harness growing demand and opportunity within the oil and gas community.
　
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For more information on Alchemy Plus and interviews, please contact Linda Bruce at Platform PR on 0131 226 3000.
For more information on Shetland Islands Council, please contact Neil Grant, Head of Economic Development, on 01595 744968.
Notes to Editors:
　
Alchemy Plus is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, Microsoft Small Business Specialist and SAGE Developer providing best-in-class IT services to businesses of all sizes. It is currently ranked in the UK’s Top 15% of Microsoft Certified Gold Partners for the quality of customer service it delivers.

Under Alchemy Plus’s "Cloud Computing" model, users are charged on a monthly basis for the actual IT resources their business uses. A recent pilot project run by Alchemy Plus has delivered an average cost saving of 28 per cent to users of the service and ongoing development work is set to unlock even greater savings. In addition to meeting the data centre needs of private and public sector clients the Shetland facility will also provide an in house platform for the provision of Alchemy's cloud computing service.

Shetland is one of the most promising locations in the world for the development of renewable energy. Currently up to 20% of the islands’ electricity demand is generated by Burradale wind farm and other turbines. Permission is being sought by Viking Energy and a subsidiary of Scottish and Southern Energy for a new wind farm generating up to 540 Megawatts of power. A project on Unst has carried out research on the use of wind power to create hydrogen and wave and tidal energy developments may follow in the next few years.

Shetland Heat Energy and Power Ltd has been serving district heating to both domestic and non domestic properties in Lerwick since 1998. Hot water is pumped around Lerwick through underground insulated pipes and enters properties through a heat exchanger, supplying their heating and hot water needs. The heat used in the scheme is generated at a Waste to Energy Incinerator located on the outskirts of Lerwick. The incinerator at the Energy Recovery Plant burns domestic and commercial waste from Shetland, Orkney and from the offshore oil industry, reducing the amount of waste going to landfill. Up to June 2009 there was a total of 1002 connections and 961 of these are receiving heat.

SHEFA-2 is an undersea communication cable linking the Faroe Islands to mainland Scotland via the Northern Isles. It is named after the route on which it is being deployed (SHEtland-FAroes) and succeeds an earlier cable called SHEFA-1 on the same route. SHEFA-2 runs from Torshavn in the Faroe Islands to Maywick in Shetland, then from Sandwick in Shetland onwards to Ayre of Cara in Orkney and from Manse Bay in Orkney to Banff in Aberdeen-shire on mainland Scotland. The total length of the cable is around 1000 km. SHEFA-2 includes the world’s longest purely passive optical fibre cable link (390km), entirely without amplifiers. With no submarine repeaters and no power feeds, repair and maintenance of the submarine cable is minimised. At the same time, the solution is future proof, as the end-point technology is the only item in need of change to increase the capacity.

Proposed Data Centre at Lerwick – Technical Details:
The data centre will be based on Alchemy’s standard multi-zone 300 rack design which will deliver an average 8kW per rack with a maximum power availability of 20 kW per rack.
It is intended that the centre will draw 100% of its primary power from a renewable energy power source and will utilise the existing grid for a secondary back up supply.

The Alchemy Plus and Shetland Islands Council proposal marries together a leading data centre design with a planned power usage effectiveness (PUE) of 1.1, one of the most energy efficient in the country, with a 100% renewable energy power source based on wind and hydrogen technologies and access to a highly effective and well established district waste heating scheme.

Shetland Islands Council has already committed to a programme of works to connect the SHEFA-2 fibre optic line from two Points of Presence, at Maywick and Sandwick, to the Lerwick data centre via separate diverse routes to ensure full redundancy of connection.