Google Earth's own photo of the site is revealing

At eleast, in how little it actually reveals (and how out of date it is):

http://maps.google.com/maps?client=opera&rls=en&q=4200%20Columbia%20Rd%2C%20The%20Dalles&sourceid=opera&oe=utf-8&safe=on&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wl

Compare, that, with this aireal shot, in the New York Times, from three years ago:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/14/technology/14search.html

The two new buildings with the massive cooling stacks are clearly the data centres, while a stack of containers sit between the two and a company canteen now occupies the very bend of the river. It is believed that cooling water is drawn direct from the river, exlaining irs proximity.

I guess Google doesn't employ any plumbers

Google "didn't know how the well water couplers would work"? "At the time, there was nothing to go on."? Errr... pressurized liquid fittings inside of expensive equipment are not exactly new technology. They could have, you know, asked an industrial plumber or pipefitter, but I guess their PhD engineers are too good to talk to a mere plumber.

@Daniel

Note the street name... "Crates way".

I'm amazed no one's done this yet

Streetview view. the car did not pass directly past Project 02, but you can see it, here, from River Road:

http://maps.google.com/maps?client=opera&q=4200+Columbia+Rd,+The+Dalles&sourceid=opera&oe=utf-8&ie=UTF8&hl=en&t=h&layer=c&cbll=45.630159,-121.204012&panoid=GNifFmwm2JDZ5g1Zgzj6tw&cbp=12,44.2529446734379,,0,2.3971078976640725&safe=on&z=16&iwloc=cent

@Ralph B and Hayden Clark

My guess is that the patent isn't on the IDEA, "put a data center in a shipping container", but in the specifics of its implementation. That's where the difficulty lies anyway - and there's nothing wrong with them protecting novel ways of doing that.

It's probably similar to bitching when someone goes to a meeting where someone says "Let's make a horseless carriage!" and then patents 4-stroke internal combustion engines.

I haven't read the patent, so I can't say for sure, but whatever else you say about Google, they're not -idiots-, and they're not likely to have tried to patent "put a computer in a big box".

And to Cade Metz... "Admits"? Do you think you could spin that any further, or do you really think that putting a data center in a box is as morally corrupt as murder or mugging?