Renewables and NBN to drive Tassie data centres

James Riley
Friday, 23 October 2009 07:03

IT Industry - Strategy

The Tasmanian Government is planning a business roadshow across the US selling the relationship between its renewable energy capability and fibre connectivity to ICT multinationals looking for data centre locations for the region.

Premier David Bartlett said the state was currently an investment attraction package to be presented initially to US tech firms with data centre needs with the view to kick-starting the industry in Tasmania.

The combination of the National Broadband Network roll-out and the state's track record in renewables – more than 70 per cent of Tasmania’s electricity requirements are from sourced from renewables – had created considerable international interest from the ICT sector, Mr Bartlett said.

"The marriage between the renewables and the optic fibre is very significant and we intend to take that message to the boardrooms of the US to say you should be looking here (in Tasmania)," Mr Bartlett told iTWire.

The Premier had one on one contact with a series of US executives at the Australian American Leadership Dialogue in August seeking detail on the NBN roll-out and opportunities that could arise from that.

Mr Bartlett told iTWire several companies had indicated an interest in possibly using Tasmanian customers as test market for services in future.

"We see ourselves as having a very significant industry development and attraction role as State Government and we obviously work together in partnership with Senator Conroy and his department on sorts of things," he said.

Mr Bartlett, a computer science graduate by training, also wants to convince local investors to invest in infrastructure of a scale that could serve customers all over the region, with governments possibly becoming anchor tenants in the data centre operations.

For companies with huge data centre requirements like Google, access to renewable energy had become a huge issue, he said. As data centres are enormous consumers of electricity, Mr Bartlett said companies made decisions with Green considerations in mind as a brand and corporate responsibility issue.

In a National Press Club address this week, the Premier was scathing of Telstra's performance in the state, and applauded the structural reform program being pursued for the sector by the Federal Government.

The state had already invested with corporates in fibre, piggy-backing on infrastructure projects of utilities. When natural gas was brought to Tasmania, the State also laid fibre in the trenches as it was built. Similarly, when Aurora Energy built additional electrical transmission capacity across Bass Strait, government helped fund a new cross-Tasman fibre roll-out at the same time.

"We anticipated that the telecommunications market – with its dominance by Telstra – would never service Tasmania’s needs," the Premier said.

"Already, before the NBN becomes a reality, we have seen the wholesale broadband price drop massively just by introducing wholesale competition on island and across Bass Strait."

Mr Bartlett did not provide any detail about the planned shareholder structure of Tasmania NBN Co, in which the Tasmanian Government and state-owned utility Aurora Energy are to be partners.

Although construction of the fibre network has started, the discussions about assets and equity are on-going.

And Communications Minister Stephen Conroy intention that the State Government and Aurora would become equity partners in the Tasmania NBN Co seems less likely.

It is understood NBN Co executive chairman Mike Quigley preferred a simpler model in which Tasmania NBN Co remains a wholly-owned subsidiary of the national company. The state and Aurora could be given equity in NBN Co in exchange for assets and work done in Tasmania, and this is now the focus of those on-going discussions.