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Sep 18, 2023

See Correction/Clarification at end of article

For the first time at one of its data centers, Facebook is debuting a high-capacity, underground fiber cable that will be part of the first $250 million phase of its Los Lunas data center set to open in 2018.

"When complete, this cable will stretch 200 miles and be one of the highest-capacity systems in the U.S.," said Facebook officials on the data center's Facebook page for the site Tuesday.

Facebook officials said the state-of-the-art optical fiber cable being constructed for Los Lunas has never been used for one of the entity's data centers before and will be 50 percent more efficient when moving information compared to high-capacity cables the company has built in the past.

"We expect the construction of this new cable will lead to more than 50 jobs over the next year, which is in addition to the hundreds of jobs created by the building of our Los Lunas Data Center," Facebook said in the announcement.

Facebook officials confirmed in an email that Missouri-based ADB Cos. is the general contractor on the fiber cable, but that all of the subcontracting work has been awarded to New Mexico companies.

Those companies include Albuquerque-based Directional Boring, Los Lunas-based IHP Construction, Los Lunas-based Volt Inc., Albuquerque-based Kelly Cable of NM Inc. Those companies will work on directional boring for the cable. Clovis-based Nick Griego and Sons Construction Inc. will work on the gravel quarry and hauling, and Las Cruces-based Armarc Landscapes is Facebook's hydro seed contractor for the project, according to Facebook officials.

Facebook's Los Lunas data center is slated to create around 50 long-term jobs, in addition to around 200 to 300 jobs for its initial construction. Located in the Huning Ranch Business Park just off Interstate 25, the first $250 million phase of the center is set to open late next year.

When it opens next year, it will join four other data centers operating throughout the U.S.

This story has been updated to correct the name of the general contractor of the Facebook fiber cable project.