
Google Makes Big Land Grab in Reno, Very Close to Tesla's Gigafactory - rck
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jaysomaney/2017/04/17/google-makes-a-big-land-grab-in-reno-very-close-to-teslas-gigafactory
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nostrademons
Datacenters seem very unlikely. In the past, Google has shown a very strong
bias toward building datacenters in areas with very cheap hydro or tidal
power. Solar is a possibility here, but building a datacenter with enough
solar panels to power it and enough batteries to keep that power uninterrupted
at night and on cloudy days seems unlikely. (It would explain the size of the
site and proximity to the Gigafactory, though.)

I would bet on some sort of test location for various Google X moonshots -
self-driving cars, Loon, Wing, and probably others. One challenge Google has
with its Mountain View location is that everything that goes on there gets
reported in the press; it's very difficult to keep new projects secret there.
The race to self-driving cars (& subsequent industrial espionage) is proof of
that. A giant test site in the Nevada desert would make it much easier to hide
new products. It'd also explain the size & proximity to the Gigafactory; I'd
bet that several of these new product ideas require batteries in some form or
another.

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rck
Good points on the moonshots. I wouldn't rule out data centers though - for
whatever reason they're getting pretty common in the Reno area:
[http://www.rgj.com/story/money/business/2017/02/15/switch-
la...](http://www.rgj.com/story/money/business/2017/02/15/switch-largest-data-
center-building-world-opens-near-reno/97925188/)

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rck
Looks like it could be for data centers, or possibly a test track for Waymo...

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JohnJamesRambo
Here comes the Terafactory™.

