Google announced construction of its first-ever Asian data center on December 8. The US$ 300 million facility is being built in Kowloon, Hong Kong, and will increase the company's reliability and speed in the region, reported constructiondigital. The ultra-modern center will incorporate innovative design features to make it one of the most efficient and environmentally-friendly facilities in the region. "One way we'll achieve region-leading efficiency (in Hong Kong) is by custom designing each element to operate at optimal efficiency," said Simon Chang, Google's head of Asia-Pacific hardware operations. The data center will use free cooling, adjust power usage for peak efficiency, and will run at higher temperatures than comparable centers. The center will be operational in 2013, and employ 25 full-time staff members. "We're working as quickly as we can get to this facility operational so we can keep up with rapid growth in capacity demand across the region. We're targeting early 2013 to start bringing the facility online," Chang added. As cloud-based technologies continue to expand, internet companies are looking to expand their capacity and reach. Google is also rumored to be building a data center in Singapore, and has already purchased nearly 25 thousand square meters of land - though no official construction date has been set.

After a 34-year hiatus following the Three Mile Island incident, the USA is restarting construction of nuclear power facilities, reported constructiondigital. Despite growing public worry over the safety and long-term consequences of nuclear power, the United States is set to resume construction of reactors after more than three decades of a building freeze that followed the incident at Three Mile Island in March of 1979. The Three Mile Island accident involved a core meltdown in Unit 2 of the nuclear generating station in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania. Nearly 40 thousand gallons of radioactive material was released into the nearby Susquehanna River, resulting in a nearly US$ 1 billion cleanup effort. Though the incident failed to derail the nuclear power industry in the United States, a moratorium was issued on construction of new nuclear facilities. The four reactors currently slated for building - two in Georgia and two in South Carolina - will be the first since the accident. The AP1000 1,100 megawatt reactors are expected to be operational by 2016, using turbine equipment provided by the Toshiba Corporation. When completed, the reactors will bring the United States' total number to 108. More than 26 reactors are under review by the USA Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The recent problems at Japan's Fukushima plant have again thrust the issue of nuclear power into the public spotlight. With the end of the moratorium on USA facilities, though, plans to expand the nation's capacity will break ground all over the country. While a possible boon to a contracting construction industry, the expansion of American reactors has many concerned about the long-term tradeoffs of nuclear energy. The Three Mile Island accident was a core meltdown in Unit 2 of the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania near Harrisburg, United States in 1979. Before the Chernobyl accident, which happened seven years later, the Three Mile Island accident was considered the largest in the history of world nuclear power and is still considered the worst nuclear accident in the USA, in its course was severely damaged reactor core, part of the fuel melted.

Venice is slowly sinking into the sea - but smart engineering, and a healthy dose of technology, will keep this would-be modern Atlantis above the waves. According to constructiondigital, in a joint effort by the Italian Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport, the Venice Water Authority, and local engineering firms, construction has begun on 78 large gates in temporarily drained portions of the city's three inlets. Named the MOSE project, the effort was first inspired by the city wide flooding of 1966, and gained momentum as water levels continue rising and soil erosion becomes more of a problem. MOSE is an acronym for Experimental Electromechanical Module, but some say it is also in connection with the figure of Moses, famous for his fabled parting of the Red Sea. During low tides, the gates would lay flat beneath the surface of the lagoon. The barriers will be full of water and rest on the sea bed. When flooding is forecast, compressed air will be pumped into the gates, emptying them of water and causing them to rise up and emerge, blocking the tide as it enters the lagoon. When the tide drops, the gates will be filled with water again and return to their housing. The Consorzio Venezia Nuova, leading Italian construction companies group is responsible for the project. Additional aspects of the project include reinforcing coastal areas and raising the quaysides. The project is estimated at US$ 6.7 billion, and plans to be operational by 2014. City planners hope the gates will put a stop to the onslaught of flood waters that submerge portions of the city up to five times a year. A more controversial benefit purported by the project is the preservation of coastal habitats, while some conservancy groups claim the barriers will disrupt the delicate ecosystems of the lagoon. For the human occupants, though, the MOSE project promises to keep the Adriatic where it belongs - out of the city streets.

A giant glacier is planned for the Mongolian capital of Ulan Bator, providing cool air and clean water for the city during summer, reported Constructiondigital. For centuries, engineers have dreamed of towing icebergs around the world, providing fresh drinking water and portable air-conditioning to the far reaches of the globe. The Mongolian capital of Ulan Bator is planning the next best thing - they're going to build one in their own backyard. Scientists hope that construction of the giant urban glacier will provide cool air and potable water for the city's inhabitants and irrigation. ECOS & EMI, a Mongolian engineering firm, will oversee the US$ 700 thousand project, which consists of the construction of artificial naleds - thick slabs of ice that form when water pressure allows water to seep through cracks during the day, which refreezes come nightfall. In northern cities like Ulan Bator, these naleds can grow more than 5 meters thick. According to a piece over at The Atlantic Cities, these naleds have been utilized for other engineering purposes for hundreds of years, most notably by military groups looking to build ice roads and bridges in colder climates. Engineers will regularly bore holes into ice forming on the Tuul River over the coming winter, adding sheets of ice which can then be utilized during warmer summer months. The process can be duplicated in other northern cities with at least a few months of temperatures in the -5C to -20C degree range.

Social networking site Facebook is to build its first data centre outside the United States in the northern Swedish town of Lulea, awarding an initial construction contract of US$ 121 million, reported Reuters. The data centre, set to be the largest of its kind in Europe, will take advantage of the climate in Lulea, among the coldest in Sweden, to cool tens of thousands of servers. Swedish construction group NCC said it was part of a joint venture with two U.S. companies, DPR Construction and Fortis Construction, which had won a contract of US$ 121 million for the first of three server buildings in the data centre. The data centre will be the northern most of its size on Earth. It is Facebook's first in Europe and will serve more than 800 million site users. Facebook said in a statement it chose Lulea, despite its remoteness some 1000 kilometers north of Swedish capital Stockholm, because its cold climate would be good for cooling and that it could provide environmentally friendly hydro-power. The three server buildings will have an area of 28,000 square meters each. Construction takes place in three phases and begins instantly. The first building is to be operational within a year and the entire facility is scheduled for completion by 2014.