create the mother of all data centers
Almost a decade ago we learned about Neom, a Saudi superproject orchestrated to diversify the economy and stop depending so much on oil. Within the ‘crazy things‘ inside Neom, The Line It was the largest: a linear city 170 kilometers long and 500 meters high to house nine million people. The project has been falling apartbut they have found a solution: convert The Line into a data center. You wouldn’t expect anything else, would you? Let’s go with context. Climbing, but downwards. The Line has gone from being the city of the future to something totally different. Over the years, the utopian megaproject of 500,000 million dollars without cars, automated, powered by renewables and that began to be built under strong controversies due to the forced displacement of native tribes it was deflating. Of the 170 kilometers and nine million inhabitants, expectations dropped to 2.7 kilometers long for a population of 300,000 inhabitants. The most recent and independent reports indicated that The Line was unrealizable and that not even a country like Saudi Arabia could bear the cost. There were experts who they pointed that it was something “unmoored from reality.” “New phase”. The problem is that there is already a certain infrastructure built and, being a failure as it already is (and as it is perceived by the rest of the world), the most sensible thing would be to reuse what has already been built to do whatever. And within that ‘whatever’, comes the new gold mine: data centers. In the area where they were going to build the megacity, there is plenty of space to house gigantic data centersbut also some operational advantages. A small part of the land that has already begun to be moved to build The Line. Something will have to be done with the work done From the country they have not said anything because, as we say, swould be accepting a failure of biblical proportionsbut for a few weeks it has been pointed out that this new phase, this conversion to data centers, would allow monetizing what until now has only been a pit of money. They already have the land, the earthworks and part of the electrical connections, and building data centers is easier than ‘pulling’ two skyscrapers kilometers and kilometers long. Neom IA. And this new approach fits with Saudi Arabia’s aspiration to become the global AI node. We have been telling for a few months how Saudi Arabia is investing a lot of money to attract companies that want to build data centers. For example, 7 billion in one fell swoop at NVIDIAhuge investment for build a city-sized data centerand have created a company called Humain in which both NVIDIA and AMD are already involved. The million-dollar purchases are not being restricted to investments in Western Big Tech. In September last year, the Saudi fund (which is ultimately owned by the country) was merged 55 billion dollars in a legendary video game company: Electronic Arts. He didn’t do it for his video games (which, admittedly, are in the doldrums), but to buy cultural influence in millions of homes. It has not been the only billion-dollar movement in the country in terms of video games, since they are now negotiating the purchase of a mobile games company for about 7,000 million dollars. Access to the Red Sea. Therefore, it is evident that the country wants to diversify its economy, even if that means investing astronomical amounts that, admittedly, are still infinitely smaller than The Line’s initial objective. And, apart from money, the Saudis have something equally important: the power to do what they want in terms of energy, territory and access to the Red Sea. data centers They need water to dissipate heat and, although the navy is not adequate (in fact, there is controversy over its freshwater needs), the Red Sea implies an outlet to the rest of the world. As? Through submarine cables. They are deploying cables and that access to the Red Sea would allow the data centers on The Line’s land to be integrated with international fiber optic nodes in Europe or Africa. “We are determined, by the grace and power of God, to achieve the transformation objectives. But we will also not hesitate to cancel or radically change any program or objective if we find that the public interest requires it” – Shura Council on Neom and The Line in September 2025 Challenges. They can also combine gas with renewables like solarwhere it has enormous potential on the ground, although there are some difficulties ahead. For example, temperatures are high and fresh water is scarce, although it could be used in heat exchange systems. Furthermore, the energy required to maintain the humidity and temperature conditions of the server rooms would be tremendous, complicating the design of the infrastructure. Promises and realities. In the end, and as different sources point out in Financial Timesit’s about getting money, diversifying the economy and data centers come into the equation. The location between three continents is good, there is plenty of land and access to both renewable and profitable energy (with projects like that of green hydrogen). And then there is the Red Sea. It certainly seems more likely that we’ll see a gigantic data center before anything else related to the Neom project. Current events are showing that Big Tech They have billions to invest in artificial intelligenceand Saudi pockets are deep to attract anyone. Some of the largest – Amazon, for example, which has just closed its data centers in Saudi Arabia by the Iranian attacks – may be attracted to the sovereign wealth fund. But of course, we will have to see if it is fulfilled. There we have the Jeddah Tower, Mukaabeither pharaonic airportother examples outside of Neom that, for the moment, are nothing more than promises. And Big Tech, with its hunger for computing, needs the data centers of the next decade… for before yesterday. Images | Neom In Xataka | AI is bringing … Read more
