Google cookie cuts $600m data center in Iowa

Google will build yet another backwoods data center for $600m – this time in Iowa.

Iowa's Governor Chet Culver – you can't make a name like that up – bragged today about his state's good fortune. Google will set up shop in Council Bluffs, Iowa on a 55-acre site. The data center announcement follows similar recent deals in North Carolina, South Carolina and Oklahoma for Google centers. And, when we say "similar," we mean it.

Google seems to have picked $600m as it default data center figure to hand to the press. That price, according to information provided by the company, includes the cost of the land, the construction of the building and the purchase of all the computer gear. Google has handed out the same $600m figure in all four states, which seems odd since it's creating new buildings in some locations, while retrofitting buildings in others.

In addition, Google always says it will hire 200 people to staff the data centers.

Google expects the Iowa workers to receive $50,000 on average – a couple grand more than the schlubs in Okie.

And, wouldn't you know it, "Last month, Gov. Culver signed a bill upgrading Iowa’s tax system related to sales tax, use tax, and property tax for computer related businesses," the governor's office said. "The state legislature's work exempts the electricity and capital investment necessary for this kind of a facility from sales tax, as is common in the manufacturing sector."

Oklahoma afforded Google an exemption from reporting its electricity usage.

Google will pay Iowa $65m in property taxes over the next 15 years and shell out $6m in sales taxes in the next two years.

We wonder if these massive data centers will be used to power Google's existing services such as search, video delivery and e-mail or if the company is gearing up for a more massive assault on the software as a service concept. The Iowa data center goes live in 2009. Will a Google PC over the wire arrive at the same time? ®