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South Korea's three biggest shipbuilders are betting that floating data centres can sidestep the local opposition facing land-based AI facilities, according to industry sources cited by the Korea JoongAng Daily.

HD Hyundai, Hanwha Ocean and Samsung Heavy Industries are each building expertise in floating data centres (FDCs) and offshore power generation, hoping to secure an early lead. The servers, electricity supply and cooling equipment all sit on a platform at sea rather than on a plot of land. Seawater or outside air can handle much of the cooling load, reducing energy demand.

Protesters broke into a Microsoft data centre construction site in Amsterdam on November 6, with some climbing a crane, during "Stop Dirty Data Centres" protests across Europe that called for a moratorium on large new projects. The protests came days after the US midterm elections, in which several candidates who had pledged tougher rules on data centres won their races.

The strain on power and water has also become a political issue in Southeast Asia. Malaysia has been turning away nearly 30% of proposals that fail to show responsible use of both, while Indonesia is trying to attract investment into a sector already short of infrastructure.

Hard evidence that data centres harm the health of their neighbours is thin, and the question has barely been studied. The complaints are more ordinary: the facilities drain local utilities, and equipment running year-round produces a low-frequency hum and vibration. In Southaven, Mississippi, residents have filed a proposed class action against Elon Musk's xAI and SpaceX over noise and vibration from the gas turbines that power a data centre complex there.

Musk's own answer is to put data centres in orbit. The shipbuilders offer something far more attainable. Moving offshore also puts distance between a facility and the people most likely to complain about it. For Korea's yards, the decisive point is that designing large offshore structures and fitting them with power and cooling systems is already what they do better than most. Japan's Mitsui O.S.K. Lines and Hitachi are chasing the same market by converting used merchant ships, aiming for commercial operations by 2027.

Samsung Heavy appears to be furthest ahead. It received approval in principle (AiP) for a 50 MW design from the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) and Lloyd's Register in April, and an ABS AiP for a 200 MW version in August. It signed an engineering contract with US developer Mousterian in July and is targeting commercialisation in the second quarter of 2028.

Hanwha Ocean received ABS approval in principle for a 60 MW concept on September 28 and has since signed a non-binding memorandum of understanding (MoU) with ABB on power and control systems. HD Korea Shipbuilding & Offshore Engineering signed an MoU with Schneider Electric in July to develop power and cooling infrastructure for offshore use. It is also working on floating power plants driven by the group's Himsen engines, which would allow a platform to generate its own electricity.

No FDC has yet reached commercial operation. It remains unclear how efficiently such platforms will run and how they will connect to power and telecoms networks, and there are no international standards for them yet, the Korea JoongAng Daily reported in July.

Shipbuilding shares rallied strongly at the start of the year on full order books, and the sector is already branching into US naval work. Lee Han-gyul, an analyst at Kiwoom Securities, sees FDCs as a further lever for investors.

"The time has come for Korean shipbuilders to find new sources of growth that can help reverse their undervaluation," he said. "FDC contracts could provide an opportunity to put unused dock capacity to work and generate additional revenue."