Virginia has long been a hub of activity for the data center market, especially within Loudoun County, also known as Data Center Alley. A number of organizations are growing their data center service footprint in the state, including CyrusOne, which launched construction of a new Virginia data center on April 8. Additionally, Capital One opened its newest data center in Chesterfield County, and InfoRelay announced the deployment of phase two at its Herndon data center.
CyrusOne’s Sterling Data Center
At the beginning of April, CyrusOne held a groundbreaking ceremony for its newest data center facility in Sterling, Va. The company previously purchased a 14-acre tract of land in Loudoun County which will be the site of a new 400,000 square foot data center. The facility will include as much as 240,000 square feet of raised floor space, 36,000 square feet of office space and the capacity to support up to 48 megawatts of critical power load.
The new facility will be a modular data center, utilizing CyrusOne’s Massively Modular design. The construction of the structure will be carried out in phases, the first of which will include the establishment of the data center’s 124,000 square foot outer shell and 60,000 square feet of raised floor space. Phase one will also see the completion of 15,000 square feet of office space and 12 megawatts of critical power load. The organization is aiming to have this phase completed by October of this year.
Scott York, Loudoun County Board of Supervisors chairman, noted that the region offers a number of benefits for data center operators, including competitive power prices, a reliable fiber infrastructure and proximity to major markets on the East Coast.
“We’re very excited to expand our footprint to Northern Virginia in order to meet existing customer demand for space in the region,” said Tesh Durvasula, CyrusOne chief commercial officer. “In addition, this new data center will enable us to more effectively serve our growing customer base on the East Coast.”
Capital One grows its presence with new Virginia data center
In mid-March, Capital One celebrated the opening of its new Virginia data center in Chesterfield County, outside Richmond. The new structure was established as part of the organization’s push to bolster its core IT infrastructure to better address client demands.
The new 242,000 square foot data center was specially designed with scalable components and redundant power supplies for maximum uptime and to accomodate future growth. The project, which was completed in just over a year, also included a focus on data center sustainability and has been recognized by the U.S. Green Building Council with LEED Gold certification.
InfoRelay launches Phase 2 at Virginia data center
Around the same time of Capital One’s announcement, InfoRelay also implemented phase two at its flagship Herndon, Virginia data center, bringing the facility to full completion. The expansion came as a result of growing demands for data center colocation services and are part of plans for total infrastructure upgrades, which began in late 2013.
Overall, the facility growth included additionally client capacity, new floor space and colocation cabinets, as well as additional components like power distribution units and hot-aisle containment cooling systems.
