Backing for new data centre on steelworks site
Nicholas Thomas, Local Democracy Reporter
Plans for a “modern, energy efficient” data centre on part of a former steelworks site in south Wales have won council approval.
Applicant Carbon3.AI has proposed redeveloping a corner of the Liberty Steel site, on the eastern bank of the River Usk, to create a data centre – a specialist facility housing computer systems – to “support the UK’s digital and AI sectors”.
The firm is described as aiming to “deliver a network of sovereign, sustainable, and secure artificial intelligence (AI) data centres” nationwide.
In a supporting statement, agents Egniol said the Newport location is “strategically located” and would also offer an “environmental upgrade of an existing brownfield site”.
Council planners describe the site as “disused” and said the proposals would allow a “server farm” to be built on the first floor level, while the ground floor would be used for car parking.
The data centre could create eight jobs if completed, the planners noted.
A location next to the River Usk does mean the data centre faces a flood risk, but the agents said sensitive equipment would be installed on raised platforms or mezzanines, which “ensures the facility can remain safe and secure in the unlikely event of floodwater ingress”.
The development site is also currently subject to a separate application to raise the ground level around the building.
If completed, the data centre will run continuously under a “small team” of technical and maintenance staff, and will be accessed using the site’s existing roads.
“Taken together, the proposed development delivers clear economic and environmental benefits with no adverse effects,” the agents said. “It accords with the development plan when read as a whole and supports [the] Welsh Government’s objectives for productive, low-carbon, digitally-enabled growth.”
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Data centres in the US are ruining the locale and raising local temperatures, water hogs and power hogs and increase noise levels to unacceptable that ruined peoples lives.
No adverse effects? Egniol must have created their report using AI and blinkers. Perhaps they consider that the energy and water requirements of this datacentre are too small to note? Or too large to confess? But there is a public interest involved here – What volumes of water will be consumed annually cooling the equipment? How will the water be treated before discharge? Will the environmental impact of the discharge be fully assessed? And how much energy will be required? What will the source of the energy be? There seem to be quite a few questions that need to be… Read more »
The direct local benefits may be limited but this project should see s106 cash and generous business rates that the council could use to kick start a wider regeneration of this area as a light industry or tech park, or residential if the freight line were opened to passenger traffic and a cycle path along the river into the city, or even a water park heated “for free” using waste heat from the data centre.
‘Energy efficient’ is the last thing data centres are.
Energy efficiency isn’t the same as energy consumption.