Environmental impact requirement for data centres progress but “not enough”

Responding to a new direction issued by the Scottish Government today which will require all data centre applications over 50MW to submit an Environmental Impact Assessment, Kim Pratt, Senior Campaigner at Friends of the Earth Scotland said: 

“Environmental Impact Assessments are necessary but not enough to support fair decision making on data centre plans. If they are comprehensive, transparent and effective EIAs can be a useful tool in understanding the expected impacts on people and nature of data centres, but they do not on their own make a project more environmentally friendly.  

“Data centres require huge amounts of energy, land and materials to build and run. Thousands of people across Scotland have called on the Scottish Government to put people and nature before the profits of big tech. 

“Until the Scottish Government has a national strategy to deal with AI data centres there must be a moratorium. A moratorium is needed now because there are planning decisions due in a matter of weeks – these communities do not have until the end of the year, which is when the Scottish Government have proposed they will act by, to provide the protection they need.”