Cnet reports that Google is building something super secret—and super huge—on a barge that's floating in the San Francisco Bay. What the hell is this thing?


According to Cnet, the structure stands four stories tall and is floating on a large barge in the San Francisco Bay, just off shore from Treasure Island. It's made out of a series of shipping containers. Cnet speculates that inside these containers, Google is building a prototype for a floating data center—which makes a lot of sense, because using sea water to cool data centers could potentially save the company a bucket of money.

Google, of course, hasn't responded to any requests for comment about the structure, but Cnet links it pretty conclusively to the company with some digging. The structure is floating on a barge that's parked next to a hanger on Treasure Island, which is leased to a shell company called By and Large LLC—which Cnet thinks belongs to Google. How they g0t there, though, is a pretty impressive bit of reporting. Be sure to check out the full report. [Cnet]


Image via James Martin/CNET