West Des Moines Mayor Steve Gaer announced Microsoft will begin construction this spring of a data center in West Des Moines. This marks the third data center the software giant has built in West Des Moines, since the first data center was announced in 2008. The total capital investment made by Microsoft for Project Osmium is expected to be between $1.5 and $2 billion.

Project Osmium will be the largest data center deployment Microsoft has ever built in the United States

The new data center will be constructed in four phases on 200 acres of land in Warren and Madison Counties. Each phase will consist of buildings that are between 256,000 and 583,200 square feet in size, and total building construction is estimated at 1.7 million square feet. Along with other investments Microsoft has in the area, Project Osmium will bring the company’s total investment in West Des Moines to nearly $3.5 billion.

“Project Osmium will be the largest data center deployment Microsoft has ever built in the United States,” said Mayor Gaer.

West Des Moines has been a data center location for Microsoft since 2008 when the Redmond, Wash. software giant began planning for Project Mountain, its first data center in Iowa.The second data center, called Project Alluvion, was announced in April 2014.

[Image courtesy: City of West Des Moines]