MOHAVE COUNTY – Situated just north of I-40 in the high-desert area of Golden Valley, between Yucca and Kingman, there’s a 717-acre parcel of land surrounded by a very tall chain-link fence. The perimeter fence is also topped with concertina-razor wire that is designed to keep unwanted guests and intruders out – trespassers beware!
The facility, currently under construction, is protected by what appears to be heavily armed paramilitary-looking guards in uniform. Some of the security force carries AR-15 rifles, and all have radios and pistols strapped to their sides. They also have drones for aerial surveillance, roving vehicle patrols and could possibly have access to remote viewing cameras and a close-proximity alert system may be installed around the exterior of the property.
No, the facility under construction in Mohave County, isn’t a sister-secret facility of Nevada’s infamous Area 51 on Groom Lake, a clandestine CIA operation or prison facility. However, the security procedures in place north of I-40 could be deemed as good or better than most military and/or government facilities.
It is actually a new $3 billion off-grid, renewable solar powered data center, that according to its owners Pegasus Group Holdings, LLC, will produce 340 megawatts of electricity and will consume all or most of the power on site – that’s nearly half the electrical power output of the Hoover Dam located in the Black Canyon area of the Colorado River. Any remaining power that is not utilized by the Golden Valley facility, according to Pegasus Group Holdings officials, can be transferred into the national or local power grids.
“I am extremely excited to welcome Pegasus Group Holdings to Mohave County. Pegasus will be locating what is reported to be the largest solar powered data center in the world, in Mohave County’s District 4 – the area that I represent,” said Mohave County Supervisor Jean Bishop. “The team at Pegasus Group Holdings has been delightful to work with and I am happy to say they have a desire to be strong community partners and an asset to the Mohave County/Golden Valley area.”
Pegasus Group Holdings is a technology infrastructure corporation that develops renewable energy projects. It has partnered with Plus Minus Power (PMP) and will operate a solar field nicknamed “The Hive.” The Hive will occupy the 717 acres and will include 16,000 mobile trailers that will have a total of about 160,000 solar panels installed on them (10 per trailer), and 350 cargo containers. There will be between 500 and 1,000 computers inside each of the cargo containers.
The Hive is a renewable energy based hyperscale data center ecosystems for enterprise colocation, differentiated multi-cloud, industry-leading telecommunications solutions, disaster recovery services and also is an off-site data storage solution for a variety of corporate clients. Tenants may include cryptocurrency miners, medical companies providing human genome mapping sequencing, movie studies rendering 3D feature films, as well as disaster recovery and data storage services.
“We are extremely serious about the security of The Hive facility in Golden Valley and especially the comprehensive-security protocols put in place by us,” said Tony Paoli, the chief sales officer at PMP. “Safeguarding our customers’ data with the most technologically advanced security measures available is our top priority.”
Golden Valley was chosen as the site for The Hive because of its close proximity to Las Vegas, in addition to other factors. “We have selected Mohave County for its abundant sunshine, quality labor force and the overwhelming support of Supervisor Jean Bishop and the Mohave County Board of Supervisors.” said Jay Bloom, a member of Pegasus Group Holdings’ Board.
“The tremendous sense of welcome and cooperation by the local government has allowed us to accelerate the launch of our project which will be operational by the end of 2019, Bloom said.”
“We are excited about our partnership with Pegasus Group Holdings and our joint project in Mohave County,” said Dan Briggs, chief executive officer of Plus Minus Power. “This is one of the most exciting uses of our solar generator assets that we have seen to date, and we look forward to moving into Mohave County with our largest installation ever.”
PMP creates, manages, maintains and monetizes renewable energy to help change the way people use and store energy.
PMP is dedicated to the ever improving the state of the art in the energy sector. PMP owns and builds micro grids for storage solutions and energy efficiencies to meet power needs. The Company collaborates to create advanced IOT deployments utilizing proprietary solar generators in a rapidly developing field. It continues to build and create new product as they revolutionize the ability for people to reduce their grid dependencies and become self-consumers of their own energy.
“Tami Ursenbach, the Director of Economic Development for Mohave County, has been a champion in getting this project deployed on an accelerated timeline, which helped in the decision to bring our facility to Mohave County. We are also pleased that our project will offer 50 new jobs to the residents of Kingman, Bullhead and the surrounding areas,” said M. Alberto Ramirez, co-founder and a member of the Pegasus Group Holdings’ Board.
For further information about Pegasus Group Holdings, LLC and/or Plus Minus Power, their current project The Hive or investment opportunities, contact Carolyn Farkas at (702) 378-4877 or email her at cfarkas@lvprsolutions.com.
“Technology made large populations possible; large populations now make technology indispensable” – Joseph Krutch (Writer)
(Editor’s Note: The information contained in the aforementioned article is compiled through interviews and various internet searches conducted by Butch Meriwether.)
