A local public data center launched this week in the Le Mans region of Sarthe, France.

The data center was delivered by Sartel, a subsidiary of French infrastructure operator Axione, and Sarthe Numerique, a public entity composed of government authorities.

The €4 million ($4.33m) project, majority financed by Sarthe Numerique, was developed to improve the digital infrastructure available to local authorities and businesses.

The data center includes 66 IT racks and will reportedly use free air cooling 87 percent of the time. The equipment operates using a high-speed fiber optic network and a low-speed LoRaWAN network. Other details have not been shared.

The companies also say that the choice to rehabilitate an existing building was intentional and claim a 60 percent reduction in the resources used, a 53 percent reduction in energy consumption during construction, and a 56 percent reduction in the carbon footprint.

The president of Sarthe departmental council and Sarthe Numerique, Dominique Le Mener, said: “Digital is a strategic issue for Sarthe. Sarthe is now 100 percent connectable to optical fiber thanks to our visionary and ambitious partnership work. Thanks to this new infrastructure, local communities and businesses will now have access to a new solution to store their data securely, directly on their territory.”

The project took a total of 18 months to complete from design to launch.