Orange Belgium has opened a $15.8 million data center in Antwerp, Belgium.

Michaël Trabbia, CEO of Orange, and president of the board Johan Deschuyffeleer officially opened the 1,000 square meter (10,800 sq ft) data center at a event yesterday.

Orange goes green

The data center will be used for radio, telecoms and IT equipment, and will offer a total capacity of more than 500 high density 52 unit racks.

The Antwerp facility has been designed to be energy efficient with closed hot aisles cooled with an adiabatic free-cooling system, that uses outside air 98 percent of the year. This sustainable focus, as well as a CO²-compensation strategy, makes Orange the only CO²-neutral telecom operator in Belgium for its network and buildings, the company claims.

“Our customers drastically increased their usage of mobile data by 79 percent compared to last year," Trabbia said. "That’s why we keep on investing heavily every year to support this massive data growth and to prepare for future services and technologies such as 5G.”

Philippe Muyters, Flemish Minister of Innovation, attended the opening: “I’m very pleased telecom operator Orange Belgium invested massively in this new data center. This highly innovative data center demonstrates that the increasing demand for data and digital solutions by Flemish families and companies, can go perfectly hand in hand with a sustainable ecological approach.”

Orange Belgium started the design of the building in 2016 together with META Architects and Engineering Offices Ingenium and Deerns.