By Monica Chen

mchen@heraldsun.com; 419-6636

DURHAM -- Gov. Beverly Perdue, IBM executives and educators from Durham cut the ribbon for Big Blue's new $362 million data center on Thursday.

As part of the grand opening, IBM announced the data center is showcasing a cloud computing solution with N.C. Central University and N.C. State University that will enable Hillside New Tech High School students in Durham to access educational materials and software applications.

William Logan, principal of Hillside New Tech, said that as part of the program, the school's students and teachers will be able to use NCCU's Microsoft Word applications and Dreamweaver without having to download and license the applications themselves.

"Financially, it's cost-saving," he said.

In cloud computing, operations typically performed on individual computers are beamed up online, making them more widely accessible and easier to update.

The new data center opened with 60,000 square feet available and ultimately will total 100,000 square feet at IBM's sprawling campus in Durham's Research Triangle Park campus.

Durham County is giving IBM $750,000 in incentives over seven years for the new center. Although it won't generate very many jobs -- IBM had originally announced it could add 10 jobs to the RTP site but did not confirm those numbers on Thursday -- the center could become a draw as the company brings clients to the area to show it off, company executives said.

The center's green features will also be a plus in that aspect. IBM is applying for the Gold certification in LEED, or Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, a national standard for green building.

The new data center has sensors that continuously read temperatures and relative humidity throughout the space, with the ability to cut annual energy costs by 15 percent. The facility also uses outside air to cool the data center for half of the year, collects rainwater for reuse and has a mechanical system that's 50 percent more efficient than previous designs.

Perdue focused on the facility's green features on Thursday in a speech to hundreds of IBM employees gathered at the building.

"You know in North Carolina, green is gold," Perdue said. "If you and I could cut our energy use back home by 15 percent, you know how much we'd save."

"People come here and they'll see our state..., and maybe some of those people will decide to come back here and retire," she added. "Ya'll are a tourist attraction for the state. I like that because I'm not paying for it."

Pat Kerin, general manager of Global Technology Services for IBM, used an analogy of a kitchen to explain the benefits of having a green data center.

Data centers must keep the computing components cool to prevent damage, and typically, stepping inside a data center feels like a cold storage locker, Kerin said. But just like in a kitchen, not everything has to be stored at freezing temperatures. At the new data center, temperatures can be changed and regulated for different areas for different clients.

"Data centers have historically been huge energy users," he said. IBM's 450 data centers worldwide make up for 35 percent of the company's energy consumption.

Construction of the new center employed 300 construction workers.