From the Computer Utility to Cloud Computing - To the Cloud: Big Data in a Turbulent World - page 35

in the cloud, and once again require a stretch of the imagination. Cisco
estimates that by the end of 2017, 69 percent of all Internet protocol (IP)
trafic will be processed in the cloud as opposed to in facilities operated
by a speciic organization, like a corporation or government unit, or by
individual consumers. Annual global cloud IP trafic is forecast to reach
5.3 zettabytes (ZB) (a single zettabyte is equal to one billion terabytes
or, in more concrete terms, 250 billion standard DVDs or 36 million
years of HD video) by the end of 2017. Global cloud trafic is expected
to grow sixfold by that year (Cisco 2013). This has led some to worry
about a cloud “plumbing problem” because the amount of data stored is
growing much faster than the bandwidth of network connections needed
to process and analyze data (Wegener 2013).
Statistics on the industry are not easily obtained because cloud data
centers are either under private control or operated by governments not
inclined to share information. Estimates vary, but one census produced
a total of 509,000 data centers worldwide at the end of 2011, occupying
close to 300 million square feet. Cloud centers are located everywhere
in the world but tend to be concentrated in places where land is plentiful
but not far from communication and power facilities. This includes what
was once agriculture land on the outskirts of population centers, where
companies can beneit from low labor costs. These considerations have
led Apple to locate its cloud data centers in rural North Carolina and in
Oregon. The North Carolina location is especially interesting for both
Apple and Google because low labor costs are matched with low energy
costs—30 percent lower in North Carolina than the national average.
Moreover, North Carolina possesses an increasingly valuable commodity
that one would not naturally associate with cloud computing: pig manure,
or, as it is referred to more euphemistically, black gold. The state holds 14
percent of the swine population in the United States and pig manure can
produce methane gas energy to help meet the massive power-consumption
needs of data centers. Apple and Google are not only competing for clicks
and customers; they are in a race to determine who can best exploit this
unlikely North Carolina resource (Wolonick 2012).
Security is a growing concern, especially as the size and therefore the
value of facilities and data have grown. This has led some cloud compa-
nies to locate their facilities in mountainous regions that, while quite far
from urban areas, offer added protection. Increasingly, the propensity for