Irish Data Centre Developers Look To New Energy And Building Methods To Get Schemes Live

One of the EU’s most successful data centre hubs is at a crossroads.

Despite strong demand for ever more data centres, power network provider EirGrid has become so concerned that the Irish energy system is creaking under the strain, it will not connect new data centres for the foreseeable future, possibly until 2028.

A long list of data centre developers and end users are on hold, pausing projects in and around Dublin in the wake of a de facto development moratorium across the capital over fears about the buildings’ high energy usage.

So the data centre world is getting creative to try and solve the problem. Hopes that data centres can plug into Ireland’s proposed new wave of offshore energy production, challenges from major users on planning bans and growing innovation around energy production are offering some hope of a way forward.

“Ultimately, we will need hyperscalers and other data centre developers and operators to consider their own renewable energy sources in order to power data centres, as grid capacity is so constrained,” CBRE Ireland Director and Head of Research Colin Richardson said.

Indeed, the previous administration urged tech companies to look outside the capital and find ways to supply their own power, and city authorities have blocked proposed new developments.

Microsoft has filed proposals with the Irish Maritime Area Regulatory Authority for three subsea cables connecting Ireland to the UK — Tuskar, SOBR1 and SOBR2 — which would run from Kilmore Quay in County Wexford to Newgale on the Pembrokeshire Coast of Wales, Dublin Bay to Anglesey, and Portmarnock to Abergele.

“In the future, Microsoft may need to obtain capacity on other systems landing in Ireland built by others not only for capacity but also for diversity and redundancy for greater resiliency,” the company said in response to a capacity consultation last year

Amazon last year also filed to develop its own subsea cable linking Ireland to the U.S. and is also working with Vodafone on the Beaufort cable, set to link Ireland from the former ESAT 1 landing station at Kilmore Quay in Wexford with Bude in England and Port Eynon in Wales.

Some data centre companies think that they can solve the power issue through the way sites are developed.

Red Admiral Data Centres, a subsidiary of Lumcloon Energy, has submitted plans to build what it has dubbed Ireland’s first energy-independent data centre. If it receives the go-ahead, the 250-megawatt facility will be located in County Westmeath and will be built in partnership with South Korea’s SK Ecoplant.

Its design includes six two-storey data halls, which means that it will generate, store and manage all its energy requirements on-campus by integrating decentralised energy resource technologies, including clean power generation, battery energy storage and a 130 MW solar array, the company said.

“By integrating cutting-edge energy technologies, we are not only ensuring energy independence for our data centre but also contributing surplus power to the grid when needed. This project embodies our vision of sustainability, innovation, and meaningful economic impact,” Red Admiral CEO Nigel Reams said in a statement.

Its location away from Greater Dublin also reflects a wider reassessment by the industry, with some of the major end users considering locating data centres closer to the sources of renewable energy rather than population hubs.

Amazon Web Services will become the first business to develop at Bord na Móna’s Energy Park in County Offaly in the midlands, around 100 kilometres west of Dublin. As part of the announcement, AWS has signed a 105 MW agreement to offtake from the Derrinlough Wind Farm, also located in County Offaly, and has pledged to invest in up to 800 MW of new renewable projects in Ireland.

It comes after a report commissioned by County Offaly’s government put forward the region as a place to “create thousands of green jobs” and rival “Dublin, Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam and Paris in being an anchor for data centres powered by renewable energy.”

Bord na Móna still controls vast tracts of former bogland and has repositioned itself as a renewable energy provider, building wind turbines and solar farms. Backed by a power purchase agreement with Microsoft, the Norwegian wind energy company Statkraft is building nine wind turbines in remote sites along County Offaly’s eastern edge.

Meanwhile, other major users are looking at ports such as Cork, Waterford or Shannon Estuary, close to the arrival point of future offshore energy production, rather than having to build a grid all over the country.

The change in geographical direction came after the Central Statistics Office found that in 2023, data centres across the country accounted for 21% of the total usage of metered electricity, up 400% since 2015 and higher than any other country, according to the International Energy Agency. Nearly all of the data centres sit on the edge of Dublin. Ireland’s Environmental Protection Agency has also flagged concerns about pollution from data centres’ on-site generators affecting areas near Dublin.

Challenges To Rules Mount

South Dublin County Council rejected Google’s plan to build another data centre last year, with Google appealing the decision in September for a 779K SF facility on a 50-acre site adjacent to the two facilities it already has there, and a decision on the appeal is expected this year.

Similarly, Echelon Data Centres has challenged an SDDC ruling blocking the expansion of its 90 MW DUB10 data centre in Clondalkin, Dublin. The company had applied to extend the existing ICT Facility Four from 21,300 SF to 170K SF. The SDCC made the decision based on “insufficient capacity in the electricity network” and “the lack of significant on-site renewable energy,” with a ruling on the appeal due by 25 March.

The backlash from Dublin-area local planning authorities has frustrated data centre developers.

“Increasing the already prominent use of decentralised power systems is paramount if the industry is to make itself self-sufficient,” Aggreko Global Sector Head of Data Centres Billy Durie said of the impasse. “Using renewables is a part of this, but there needs to be an emphasis on using bridging solutions, as they are the key towards tackling the here-and-now for data centres.”

And data centre developers are doing just that. Investment firm Digital Transformation Capital Partners has launched new data centre platform GreenScale and is planning to deploy 170 MW of capacity across sites in Derry, Northern Ireland, and at the Letterkenny Technology Park in Donegal. GreenScale’s two Irish sites have been inherited from Atlantic Hub, a data centre developer acquired by DTCP.

There are also plans for a data centre in County Louth on Ireland’s east coast. Premier Pericase owns the land and is seeking permission to demolish existing buildings and construct a 286K SF, three-storey data centre as part of an industrial development in Drogheda. The town is already home to a data centre used by Amazon at the IDA Business Park, and another two data centres are also planned for the park.

Avaio has also filed to build a data centre on land in County Mayo after Mayo Data Hub submitted an application to construct a 313K SF, two-storey data centre building, with the first phase due live in the second half of 2026.

However, the big question remains whether Ireland’s regions will soon face the same sort of development clampdown as Greater Dublin and whether the offshore contracts for sustainable power production handed out by the previous administration can keep pace with Ireland’s data centre requirements.