ENVIRONMENTAL CAMPAIGNERS ARE calling on the government to reconsider its policy on data centres following new Irish research highlighting their impact on climate commitments.
The University College Cork research found that electricity demand from data centres has grown at an annual rate of almost 23% since 2015.
Electricity demand of other sectors, including transport, residential and commercial, and public services, grew by less than 0.5% over the same period.
The new report, published by Friends of the Earth and Hannah Daly, a professor of sustainable energy at UCC, also points to data centres seeking connections to the gas network due to challenges securing an electricity grid connection. It states that this threatens Ireland’s ability to meet legally binding climate commitments.
Similar findings were uncovered in an investigation last month by The Journal Investigates, which found that backup and emergency generators attached to data centres in Ireland are releasing huge quantities of carbon dioxide emissions.
Our investigation found that over 135,000 tonnes of CO2 was emitted from these centres in the last five years from generators not on the electricity grid.
This amount of CO2 is comparable to running roughly 33,750 cars for a year in terms of the climate pollution produced.
The Journal Investigates also uncovered plans for new data centres to build on-site power generation facilities run on natural gas that only operate during times of constrained electricity demand from the grid.
These peaking plants, as they are known, can also send electricity generated from natural gas back to the grid and operate as an alternative power source for the data centres.
Speaking to The Journal Investigates last month, Daly said this shift to using natural gas risks creating a fossil fuel lock-in, as once the plants are built there is an incentive to keep using them.
The new research by Daly highlights that all additional wind energy generation across Ireland was absorbed by data centres between 2017 and 2023.
This means that renewables are not delivering net reductions in emissions due to the growth of data centres.
Earlier this year, The Business Post revealed that growth in renewable energy projects for 2023, mainly from solar and wind, had been entirely cancelled out by the growth in electricity demand from data centres in the same year.
The UCC report also finds that electricity demand from data centres has far outstripped additional renewable energy procured through power purchase agreements in recent years.
These agreements allow data centre operators to balance their emissions over the year by purchasing renewable energy from wind or solar farms across the country.
Speaking on the new research, Jerry Mac Evilly, head of policy at Friends of the Earth called on political parties to support “a pause on connecting more data centres” as part of the new Programme for Government until the threats data centres pose to the climate have been addressed.
Conor O’Carroll is an investigative reporter with The Journal Investigates.
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