In a nutshell: Iceland meets most of its energy needs through various forms of domestically produced renewable energy. According to three companies developing a new data center service, the Nordic island nation could also be the ideal environment for mission-critical cloud applications.
Vespertec, Sardina Systems, and Borealis have developed an innovative IT solution called IceCloud Integrated Services (IIS). Located at the Borealis Data Center campus in Iceland, the system is powered by renewable energy sources like hydroelectric and geothermal. The three companies aim to provide an all-in-one IT solution that offers significant cost savings while helping customers meet the European Union's new carbon neutrality goals.
The fully managed IIS cloud service leverages the partners' expertise in different areas of the data center industry. Vespertec provides the hardware infrastructure, while Sardina integrates its FishOS cloud platform, based on OpenStack. Borealis owns the facility where the new system is physically installed.
According to Vespertec, IIS can deliver up to 30 percent savings on energy costs, thanks to Iceland's naturally cold climate, which reduces the need for artificial cooling. Water consumption is also significantly reduced due to the country's "year-round" natural cooling temperatures. The consortium claims that HPC cluster costs are reduced by 80 percent, while approximately 3,750 tons of greenhouse gas emissions (CO2) are saved annually.
IceCloud has been designed to meet the needs of specific enterprise ventures, according to Vespertec. The solution is said to excel in disaster recovery applications, batch processing, simulation workloads, development and testing, and more. Clearly, this is not intended to compete with AWS; instead, IIS partners are targeting enterprises that need to carry out time-critical workloads in research, finance, logistics, or telecommunications.
The IIS business model includes a single point of contact for all customer needs, ensuring consistency in managing hardware, software, and data warehousing inquiries during office hours. Vespertec describes IIS as a "holistic approach" that blends advanced technology with eco-friendly practices, although the practical implications of this from a business perspective are not entirely clear.
The strategically located, sub-15 ms latency IIS data center solution is currently offered as a ready-to-go proof-of-concept. The three companies involved in the venture are inviting interested parties to try out the system. Customers will receive a personalized quote and unified agreement tailored to their specific needs and budget, which should "significantly" simplify the adoption of the IIS infrastructure.