Silicon Valley bet $200M on an AI data center floating in the ocean

Investors in Silicon Valley such as Palantir co-founder Peter Thiel has bet hundreds of millions of dollars on placing wave-driven AI data centers in the middle of the world’s oceans — a move that resonates with tech companies facing increasing challenges in building AI data center projects on land.

The latest money $140 million in funding is backing the company Panthalassa complete a pilot production facility near Portland, Oregon, and accelerate the deployment of mobile “nodes” to generate energy, according to a May 4 press release. Instead of sending renewable energy to data centers, the floating hub can power AI chips and send tokens representing AI models to customers around the world via satellite link.

“Panthalassa’s theory transforms the power transmission problem into a data transmission problem,” Benjamin Leecomputer programmer and engineer at the University of Pennsylvania, told Ars. “Performing AI calculations at sea would require transferring samples to areas around the ocean and answering the questions.”

Each node is similar to a large circular iron floating on water with a tube extending down. The flow of waves drives water up through the tube into pressurized water, where it can be released to spin a turbine generator that produces renewable energy for the AI ​​chips inside.

Panthalassa says the node’s AI chips can also be programmed using ambient water, which could provide an advantage over traditional information centers. “Computing from the sea can give you a lot of cooling because the temperature there is very low,” Lee said. “Museums use a lot of electricity and fresh water for cooling.”