Scotland's Hyperscale AI Data Centre PROBLEM
The Scottish Government was urged to back a Scottish Green vote to halt all hyperscale data centre applications, as a huge wave of speculative proposals threatens to overwhelm Scotland’s energy system.
The crunch vote was the first time MSPs had the opportunity to vote directly on the issue.
Councils are facing a surge of applications for massive new data centres. If just the first 24 were approved, they would consume 1.5 times as much electricity as the whole of Scotland currently uses at peak times.
The Scottish Greens have called for all data centre applications above 50MW to be paused until Scotland has a clear national strategy, backed by robust criteria for deciding which projects should be allowed to proceed. The SNP’s National Council has also backed a pause, and some SNP MSPs have spoken out in support.
But action from the Scottish Government has so far fallen far short of what is needed. Last month, Ministers introduced new rules requiring councils to notify them when a data centre application is submitted. But the changes do nothing to pause applications, stop unsuitable projects or properly scrutinise the scale of the proposals now piling up.
It appears a pause will now be introduced after the Greens pushed the First Minister at First Minister's Questions after this debate.
