Early this morning, Wired.com published an article about
Google’s recent acquisition of an abandoned paper mill that the company will
use to house a new, state-of-the-art data center. One of the most compelling
things about the article, and Google’s use of the building, is the symbolism
behind it all. One of the internet’s biggest corporations expanding their reach
farther than ever by “recycling” a facility that manufactured the very medium
they’re replacing. Poetry for the tech-minded, but bitter irony for those who
are still clinging to the last threads of the print industry.
The building, which sits on the coast of the Baltic Sea just
outside of Hamina, Finland, operated as a paper mill from 1953 until 2008 was
forced to close due to the decline of the print medium and Google took
immediate advantage of the situation. Google’s green initiatives go beyond the
simple act of renovating and existing structure opposed to building from the
ground up in a location; the facility itself comes with its own environmentally-friendly
features. The builders of the paper mill dig a tunnel that used water from the
Baltic to cool its steam-powered generators, and Google has adapted method to
keep the data center’s array of servers from running too hot.
As we move out of the industrial age and into the era of
information and factories, plants and mills are being left to dilapidate;
Google’s actions in Finland should be repeated more often. In Germany, for
instance, empty steel mills and bombed-out relics from World War 2 now serve as
restaurants, recreation centers and other businesses. Think of all the towns in
America that are slowly dying thanks to the factories that were once the
cornerstone of local economy. Those buildings sit unused, while
forward-thinking companies could easily repair and renovate, thereby rejuvenating
the town itself.
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