As Power Outages Continue, Former Nuclear Bomb Shelter Turned Strategic Data Center Maintains Essential Data for Agencies Providing Mission Critical, Life-Saving Services

Facility Recently Acquired by Houston-based Data Journey

MONTGOMERY, Texas, July 17, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Amidst massive power outages across Houston following Hurricane Beryl, a former nuclear bomb shelter turned data center is ensuring that essential data used by agencies and major corporations responsible for mission-critical and life-saving operations remains intact should their primary systems fail.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Beryl, the Montgomery, TX data center known as the Westland "Bunker" is seeing a significant increase in activity as agencies closely monitor their back-up systems in the event their primary facilities are impacted by a sudden power interruption.

Perched at the highest point in Montgomery County at 550 Club Drive, just south of Highway 105, the Bunker houses an underground data center roughly two floors below ground. The facility has been in operation for approximately 20 years and can accommodate an additional 45 MW of computing power for potential tenants.

Moreover, the Westland Bunker is located in the MISO energy grid and is serviced by Entergy. The facility is not on the ERCOT (Texas) energy grid serviced by CenterPoint and therefore is not subject to power interruptions experienced throughout the Houston area following a storm or major freeze.

The facility is operated by Data Journey, a Houston- based digital infrastructure private equity firm, managed and owned locally.

Since it recently acquired the center, the new ownership has received a large volume of inquiries from corporate clients that recognize the benefit for operational redundancy to house their critical business continuity on a separate energy grid. 

The facility has provided 100% uptime and access during Hurricanes Ike, Harvey and Beryl in addition to 100% uptime during Winter Storm Uri in February 2021. By offering office space with showers and kitchen facilities along with the data center space, companies are able to send critical employees to work in an air conditioned, fully connected space even if the rest of Houston is without power and connectivity.

"The Bunker and its surrounding facilities have proven its strategic positioning for our present tenants and future tenants that need that data center reliability and redundancy," says Dr. Ishnella Azad, managing partner of Data Journey.

In addition to a core group of strategic data center clients for which the Bunker provides mission critical services, numerous midstream oil and gas companies also depend on the facility to store and manage large volumes of data and support real-time monitoring and control systems to ensure the safe and efficient operation of pipelines and storage facilities.

For further information about the facility and its potential for your data center needs please go to www.datajourney.com

About the Westland Bunker:
The Bunker is a state-of-the-art Tier III data center and business continuity campus that provides colocation of critical operations. Its adjacent 100,000 square-foot, four-story office building serves as a business continuity and disaster recovery center. The Bunker has the ability to meet or exceed any requirements for colocation, business continuity or managed services.

About Data Journey:
Data Journey is an alternative asset management firm dedicated to investing in mid-scale data center infrastructure through a value-add/opportunistic investment strategy.

SOURCE Data Journey