Data Centre Watch

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147 entries · showing 1–15

1. 23 Oct 2026 Updated 23 Oct UK England and Wales Policy

   Eagle moves to intervene in water bills — a first for the price review

   The environment secretary, Angela Eagle, has written to water companies and regulators saying she will intervene in the next Ofwat price review — something no government has done in the five-yearly process. Her letter sets the priorities: affordable bills and value for money, investment in technology that cuts costs, early intervention on leaks and sewage, better communication, and more decision-making power for local communities and leaders. Defra calls it 'not a business-as-usual price review' and 'the beginning of a long-term transition to a different model for the water sector'; campaigners for public ownership called it reshuffling deckchairs. The last review authorised a £104bn programme and a 36% rise in average bills by 2030.

   Why it matters: The first crack in the settlement that lets companies fund investment through bills while outcomes slip — and it is being done by letter, before the next review has formally begun.

   Source: The Guardian [V]

2. 20 Oct 2026 Updated 23 Oct World Umatilla, Oregon, United States Reported

   Umatilla declares an emergency over the data-centre revenue it lost

   The city council in Umatilla, Oregon, voted 5-1 to declare a state of emergency after the governor paused state environmental permits for new data centres, citing about $6m in direct losses and threats to a police station and water infrastructure that data-centre revenue was paying for. Local officials across eastern and central Oregon say they were blindsided by the statewide pause, which followed concern about the industry's water and power demands.

   Why it matters: The mirror image of the industry's pitch for councils to keep data-centre business rates: revenue that arrives with the campus leaves with it, and the services it paid for stay.

   Source: Data Center Dynamics / Oregon Capital Chronicle [V]

3. 23 Oct 2026 UK Wealdstone, Harrow, London Reported

   Burst main floods Wealdstone High Street during hosepipe ban

   Affinity Water confirmed a supply outage and sent engineers after a burst main flooded Wealdstone High Street in Harrow, closing the road through the morning of 23 October with diversions in place, the fire brigade and police working alongside the company. A small incident in a long season: the same network is under a hosepipe ban in drought, and leaks in the region are already under scrutiny after the BBC found residents waiting months for repairs.

   Why it matters: The ban asks households to save water while the pipes lose it — and the company’s own patch keeps supplying the evidence.

   Source: Harrow Online [V]

4. 23 Oct 2026 UK England Reported

   Reservoirs fall again despite the rain — 54% stored, 13 exceptionally low

   Two-thirds of England's reservoirs lost water in the week to 20 October even as the country took a second week of rain. National storage sits at 54%, about 22% below the long-term average, with 18 reservoirs under half full and 13 exceptionally low — among them Ardingly, Wimbleball, Colliford, Roadford, Stithians, Grafham and Rutland. England has had 52% of its October rainfall and the south-west just 43%; groundwater keeps falling, and the Environment Agency has recorded 411 drought incidents this year, more than in all of 2022. It warns farmers may not refill storage before the irrigation season opens on 1 November.

   Why it matters: The rain has stopped the argument, not the drought: storage kept falling in the week the storm arrived, and the refill season starts with the reservoirs still emptying.

   Source: Environment Agency — weekly drought report, 16–22 October 2026 (GOV.UK) [V]

5. 23 Oct 2026 World Gorodets, Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, Russia Reported

   Ukrainian drones hit Russia's federal tax data centre at Gorodets

   A government data centre operated by Russia's finance ministry and federal tax service in Gorodets, about 425km east of Moscow, was damaged in overnight drone strikes; the regional governor reported three injuries. Open since 2015, the site is one of two centres processing state registry and tax data in a geo-distributed setup, and the monitoring outlet ExileNova+ says damage there 'could potentially affect the operation of state information systems'. It is the latest in a campaign in which both sides have struck data centres: Kyiv's GigaCenter, Datagroup, Vodafone Ukraine and Odesa's Tenet have been hit, and Ukraine has struck Yandex and Sberbank facilities.

   Why it matters: Data centres are now military geography — and the further a site sits from the front, the more the 'critical infrastructure' label reads as a targeting list.

   Source: Data Center Dynamics [V]

6. 22 Oct 2026 UK Chapelcross, Dumfries and Galloway, Scotland 1000 MW Consultation open

   Chapelcross objections pass 10,000

   More than 10,000 objections have been lodged against CX Tech's £16.5bn, 1,000MW hyperscale campus at Chapelcross — counted through a portal set up by the Scottish Greens rather than the council's own register. At full capacity the site would draw about 7 million MWh a year, which campaigners equate to the electricity used by two million Scottish homes. The Greens' Laura Moodie says the developer's own environmental statement finds a 'moderate adverse and significant' impact, and that emissions would exceed Dumfries and Galloway's legal greenhouse-gas limit by almost double at full operation. CX Tech says surplus heat and dedicated renewable connections mean the claim about household bills is 'completely incorrect', that the campus is 'designed to be operationally net zero', and that it would bring 750 construction jobs, 450 permanent roles and 40 apprenticeships a year.

   Why it matters: The clearest test yet of whether 'largest in the world' can be waved through a council that has been told not to decide until national guidance lands in December.

   Source: The National / Scottish Greens [C]

7. 22 Oct 2026 UK Newport, Wales 1000 MW Approved

   Era4's Newport steelworks campus targets 1GW

   Era4 has set out details of The Mill, on the former Liberty Steel site in Newport: 230 acres, ultimately up to 1GW and as many as 400,000 Nvidia Vera Rubin GPUs, with the first stage — modular units inside existing buildings — due online next year. Planning permission was granted in April. The company says power will be a mix under long-term contracts that does not affect local communities or industry, and that cooling will be closed-loop to keep water use to a minimum.

   Why it matters: Brownfield reuse and a gigawatt of new demand on a Welsh connection — the shape of the next wave, and a test of whether 'responsibly sourced' survives contact with the grid queue.

   Source: Data Center Dynamics [V]

8. 22 Oct 2026 UK United Kingdom Policy

   AI giants give ministers 12 months before datacentre protests bite

   An AI infrastructure taskforce including Nvidia, Microsoft and Cisco has told the government there is 'roughly 12 months' to build a 'compact' that earns public consent, warning that the organised opposition which has stopped fully permitted projects in the United States is beginning to appear here. The Sovereign AI Leadership group wants recommended benefit terms for host communities — an indicative contribution scaled to a site's size, and councils keeping more business-rate revenue (in England's AI growth zones they already keep all the additional rates). PauseAI UK said people would find being 'bought off' undignified; Foxglove said retained rates would mean the companies 'would not pay a penny more'.

   Why it matters: The industry now says out loud what the planning record shows: consent, not capital, is the constraint — and it is bidding for community support with tax that would otherwise go to the centre.

   Source: The Guardian [V]

9. 6 Oct 2026 Updated 22 Oct World Finland Delayed

   Finland halts Google data-centre work over missing impact assessments

   Finland's Licensing and Supervision Authority (LVV) ordered Google's Tuike Finland Oy to suspend preparatory works at its Muhos and Kajaani (Otanmäki) sites — part of a €13bn northern-Finland build — after 330 hectares of forest were felled at Muhos without a completed environmental impact assessment. The Guardian's 22 October investigation put the clearance at about 250,000 trees at Muhos and an estimated 150,000 more at Otanmäki, with the topsoil stripped and brown water running into a stream that feeds the Oulujoki river. Enforcement and a fine may follow: Google's country manager has apologised, the prime minister has called it a 'cold shower', and a petition for tighter rules and a compensation fee has passed 93,000 signatures. Separately, the plan's power draw (reportedly up to half of the Loviisa nuclear plant's output) is raising electricity-price concerns in Finland and Estonia.

   Why it matters: A regulator stopping the diggers — the 'assess it first' argument, actually enforced.

   Source: The Guardian [C]

   Changes (3)

   1. 22 Oct 2026 — Guardian investigation: about 250,000 trees felled at Muhos and an estimated 150,000 at Otanmäki; topsoil stripped, brown water reaching the Oulujoki; 93,000-signature petition; the prime minister calls it a 'cold shower'.
   2. 12 Oct 2026 — Added the power-price angle: local and Estonian electricity-price concern over the plan's grid draw.
   3. 6 Oct 2026 — First filed.
10. 1 Jul 2026 Updated 22 Oct UK England Policy

    Three data-centre campuses moved out of local planning in four months

    Section 35 directions under the Planning Act 2008 have moved three campuses out of local planning in four months: Wapseys Wood, Buckinghamshire (16 March), Ampthill Road, Central Bedfordshire (15 June) and New Barn Road, Dartford (1 July). Once directed, a Development Consent Order examined by the Planning Inspectorate — and decided by the secretary of state, not the council — replaces the planning application. The data-centre National Policy Statement meant to set the tests for these decisions was expected early in 2026 and is still unpublished.

    Why it matters: It changes who decides and how you object — from a council committee to a national examination, with the secretary of state holding the final word.

    Source: GOV.UK — Section 35 direction, New Barn Road, Dartford (Planning Act 2008) [V]

    Changes (1)

    1. 22 Oct 2026 — Compiled from the GOV.UK Section 35 directions after a 22 October planning-reform analysis; three data-centre campuses have now been moved into the NSIP regime.
11. 21 Oct 2026 World Kyiv, Ukraine Reported

    Russian shelling damages Kyiv's GigaCenter data centre

    Russian shelling has damaged Kyiv's GigaCenter data centre, with service disruptions possible, according to Ukrainian reporting. It follows the pattern of the past month: Russia hit or disrupted 14 named Ukrainian operators from mid-September, and Ukraine struck three Yandex data centres in response.

    Why it matters: Data centres are now targets on both sides of the war — the argument Scotland's security debate is only beginning to absorb.

    Source: UA.NEWS / Interfax-Ukraine [C]

12. 21 Oct 2026 World Ashburn, Virginia, US Withdrawn

    Amazon withdraws Ashburn data-centre plan in deal with Loudoun County

    Amazon has withdrawn its proposal to build data centres on George Washington University's Loudoun County campus in Ashburn — the heart of the world's largest data-centre market — under an agreement with the county that pivots the site to mixed-use development, with a housing trust fund element reported. It lands as Loudoun runs its own 12-month moratorium and Virginia debates a three-year statewide pause.

    Why it matters: In the industry's capital, a hyperscaler has traded a campus for housing — the clearest sign yet that consent, not demand, is the binding constraint.

    Source: WTOP / Washington Business Journal [C]

13. 21 Oct 2026 World United States Reported

    A data centre that makes its own water from the air

    Austin-based Aquaria has opened applications for a 2027 pilot of 'Hydrogrid' — modular atmospheric water generators for data centres. Each 40-foot container produces up to 5,300 gallons a day and can be stacked; a 50-unit deployment could yield up to 265,000 gallons a day on under four acres, bolted onto existing storage and treatment without changing the cooling system. First units ship in Q3 2027. 'Water is now a schedule risk and an approval risk,' its chief executive says.

    Why it matters: The 'bring your own water' counterpart to on-site generation — a sign that water, like power, is becoming a supply the developer must secure before consent.

    Source: DCD / Aquaria [C]

14. 21 Oct 2026 World Australia Reported

    NEXTDC cuts guidance after Melbourne power delay

    Australian operator NEXTDC has cut its FY27 guidance after a power delay at its M3 data centre in Melbourne. A listed developer revising earnings because the grid did not arrive on time — the same failure mode as Nscale, now with a hard financial number attached.

    Why it matters: Power-delay risk is now showing up in guidance, not just project timelines.

    Source: Fool AU / ASX announcement [C]

15. 21 Oct 2026 UK Somerset, England Reported

    Lib Dems call for on-farm reservoirs as Somerset dries

    Sarah Dyke, the Liberal Democrat MP for Glastonbury and Somerton and the party's rural affairs spokesperson, has called for a national extreme-weather emergency strategy, an overhaul of the water industry and a 'call to store' programme funding on-farm reservoirs, after Somerset was moved into severe drought on 15 October. Wimbleball reservoir, which supplies around 300,000 customers across Somerset, Devon and Dorset, stood at 16% against roughly 75% normally expected at this time of year. An ONS survey of 10,620 adults found 40% said they had been affected by drought in the past year.

    Why it matters: The drought response is splitting in two: cut demand (bans, restrictions) or build storage (reservoirs, on-farm tanks). Both arguments are now being made in the same county, with the reservoir serving 300,000 people at a fifth of its normal level.

    Source: Somerset County Gazette [V]