Great Oaks South Generating Facility

SV1, LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Equinix, LLC (SV1 or applicant) filed an application with the California Energy Commission (CEC) seeking an exemption from the CEC’s jurisdiction (Small Power Plant Exemption, or SPPE) for the Great Oaks South Backup Generating Facility (GOSBGF) (20-SPPE-01) and proceed with local permitting rather than requiring certification by the CEC. In reviewing an SPPE application, the CEC is the lead agency under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and will perform the required environmental analysis.

The GOSBGF would be part of the Great Oaks South Data Center (GOSDC or project) to be located in the City of San Jose. The GOSDC would also include three data center buildings and a connection to a new Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) substation. The three, two-story GOSDC buildings would each be 182,350 square feet. The approximately 18-acre project site is associated with three addresses (123, 127, and 131 Great Oaks Boulevard), with each address designated to one building assigned by the City of San Jose.

GOSBGF would have a generating capacity of up to 99.0 megawatts (MW) supporting the three data center buildings. GOSBGF would consist of 36, 3.25-MW diesel fired generators in six generation yards that would each be separately electrically interconnected to the three data center buildings and used exclusively to provide backup generation and uninterruptible power supply for its tenant’s servers, only operating when the PG&E electrical service to the data centers has failed. In addition, the GOSBGF would include three life safety diesel fired generators, each capable of generating 0.50 MW.

The project would include a new PG&E substation (Santa Teresa Substation), a 115 kilovolt (kV) transmission line extension to the substation from the existing Metcalf-Edenvale 115 kV transmission line, and five new 21 kilovolt (kV) distribution feeders that would extend underground either along Via Del Oro or along Great Oaks Boulevard, or via both routes to the project site. The applicant understands that PG&E is currently constructing the substation. Project elements would also include switchgear and distribution cabling to interconnect the six generation yards to their respective buildings.