Sydney hyperscale data centre officially opened by PM

Macquarie Data Centres and Macquarie Government, part of Macquarie Telecom Group (ASX: MAQ), hosted Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Friday to officially open the company’s Intellicentre 3 (IC3) East hyperscale data centre in Sydney.

Also attending the event was Penske Australia’s Managing Director, Hamish Christie-Johnston, and Energy Solutions’ Director, Steve Turton, who worked closely with Macquarie Data Centres in the delivery of a complete engineered backup power solution for IC3 East. The mtu solution comprises eight 20V4000 DS3100 generators that supply 20 megawatts of backup power to the IC3 East data centre.

In addition to the provision of Rolls-Royce Power Systems’ mtu brand of generators, Penske Australia’s expert team designed and delivered plant room acoustics, fuel systems and an overarching dual-redundant high-voltage supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system using the latest parallel redundancy protocol to manage generator load and high-voltage switching. The mtu generators aim to ensure seamless maintenance of operations in the case of a power loss.

“Our superior local engineering and support expertise combined with mtu’s technologically advanced equipment delivers a trusted solution for this critical requirement,” Christie-Johnston said.

“Taking only 20 seconds to power the facility in the case of a mains system outage, the mtu generators yield confidence in underpinning the critical operations of the IC3 East data centre.

“Our partners at Macquarie have relied on our trusted Penske-mtu combination for over six years and across three sites. It’s this same trusted combination that has also led to mtu engines powering a range of other applications, including in the Australian Defence Force in Armidale-class patrol boats, Anzac-class frigates, offshore patrol vessels, Hobart-class destroyers, Boxer combat reconnaissance vehicles and armoured personnel carriers.”

Speaking at the event, the Prime Minister hailed IC3 East as an example of the type of secure, sovereign and compliant infrastructure Australia needs to bolster its cybersecurity posture and accelerate the digital economy.

“Increasingly, our economy and our security depend on each other. This campus is about both — a mighty $200 million data centre, Australian owned, Australian operated, one of the most trusted and certified in Australia, with a team of highly trained engineers delivering up to 50 megawatts of data storage capability,” he said.

Macquarie Data Centres CEO David Hirst welcomed the Prime Minister and emphasised the importance of secure cloud and data centre infrastructure in powering Australia’s digital economy.

“The government has consistently underscored the importance of cybersecurity and data sovereignty, including through the Cyber Security Strategy; [the] decision for all government data to be stored in onshore Certified Strategic or Certified Assured data centres; and the Critical Infrastructure Bill, which formally recognised key data storage, telecommunications and processing industries as Australian critical infrastructure.

“We’re proud to support that vision by embedding security and sovereignty into the design and operation of our Data Centre Campuses across Sydney and Canberra.”