Seabed Warfare Landscape: China deploys world’s first proper Offshore Data Centre
China went operational with the world’s first underwater data centre on 15th May 2026. Placed in shallow water in the Lin-Gang Special Area off the coast of Shanghai. The transformer structure is visible in satellite imagery amidst a vast offshore wind farm in the vicinity of 30.5386, 121.7543.
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Installation of seabed elements started in 2023, with the visible above-sea element installed in October 2025. Below it, a series of cylinders on the seabed provide 2.3 megawatts of capacity, with a planned capacity of 24 megawatts. So while the current capacity is similar to typical onshore data centres, its eventual size will be equivalent to a low-end hyperscale data centre. If successful this is just one of many.
Other data centre providers, notably Microsoft, have experimented with offshore data centres but this is the first operational ‘full size’ offshore data centre.
Environmentally and economically these promise key advantages. The new data centre uses non-powered refrigerant circulation technology, using seawater as a cooling source to achieve zero freshwater consumption. This compares to around 40,000 tons of freshwater for a typical data centre annually. This is cheaper, although maybe its effect on the local sea environment might be an ecological consideration. All the same the significant reduction in energy consumption and carbon emissions is promising for the future of ‘green computing power’.
However, the implications on seabed warfare and protection of critical national infrastructure (CNI) need serious reflection. Iran has already shown the vulnerability of onshore data centres, but these seem even more vulnerable to a bad actor with explosive intentions.
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