A new company in Hokkaido, Japan, plans to raise eels in 2023 using a data center.
To be precise, they use water that is heated using a data center that is currently being built. Not only that, the data center will also be cooled using snow collected from the city's streets.
The White Data Center (WDC) was launched in April 2021, but is still in the development stage. So for the time being, the company is looking for a side business to take advantage of the hot air exhaust from the data center.
There are several livestock that could be considered. Such as Abalone (a kind of shell), sea urchins, and so on. But in the end, eel became the best choice because of its high price, around USD 100 per kg.
WDC also had time to try to grow cherry tomatoes, Japanese mustard spinach, to ear mushrooms. Just like eels, this mushroom has a short growing cycle. Make it a suitable investment.
On February 25, WDC started eel farming by releasing 1,700 eel seeds. They will show that the eel will be the first eel to be bred in Hokkaido.
Normally, eels require warmer air temperatures than normal air temperatures in Hokkaido, but WDC believes the temperature generated by its data center can keep the eel pond at 33 degrees Celsius.
Previously, WDC had also started breeding 6,000 eels since last November using melted snow. They cooperated with the city of Bibai to do this.
Bibai is a city that is frequently hit by blizzards, and WDC uses snow collected from the city's streets to cool data centers. Then the melted snow will be added to the pond for raising eels.
WDC believes that melting snow can improve the quality of the eels they raise, both in terms of taste and size, as quoted from Techspot, Monday (11/4/2022).