Google Chocolate Factory patents Data Center Navy

The Mountain View Chocolate Factory has received a patent on its plans for a navy of podified data centers. On Tuesday, the US Patent Office gave Google exclusive rights to what the search giant cum world power calls a "water-based data center." This collection of Googlicious data center pods would sit on some sort of sea vessel anchored somewhere offshore, using the ocean waves for both power and cooling. As the patent describes it: "Computing centers are located on a ship or ships, which are then anchored in a water body from which energy from natural motion of the water may be captured, and turned into electricity and/or pumping power for cooling pumps to carry heat away from computers in the data center." And as Data Center Knowledge points out, such computing centers would be free of real estate and property taxes.
These seaworthy data centers might be semi-fixed operations. Or they could provide portable computer resources in times of trouble. "For example," the patent reads, "a military presence may be needed in an area, a natural disaster may bring a need for computing or telecommunication presence in an area until the natural infrastructure can be repaired or rebuilt, and certain events may draw thousands of people who may put a load on the local computing infrastructure.

Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/04/30/google_data_center_navy_patent/