new construction data centers There are blackouts in the UK and Europe due to insufficient electricity supply. Utility companies in the US are also struggling to keep up with demand.

David Sleath, CEO of development giant Segro, said it would ideally invest “hundreds of millions of dollars and more” to build new data centres. Times. “The biggest constraint is access to power,” he told the publication.

Segro, which operates 35 data centers in the UK, had to wait “a number of years” for infrastructure upgrades that increased its grip capacity before breaking ground on a planned development.

A spokesman for National Grid told The Times it was connecting data center developments to the grid “as quickly as possible”, while a government spokesman said efforts were ongoing to bring stalled projects forward. The spokesman added that National Grid was collaborating with energy regulator Ofgem to update its grid connection process.

Power outages: A major area of ​​concern

There are power outages top concern For data center companies around the world, including North America, as they make it harder to secure capacity. a report Bain and Company It found that U.S. utilities will need to increase their energy production by up to 26% of the 2023 total to meet projected demand in 2028.

In fact, data center power consumption in the US according to the Electric Power Research Institute more than double what it is now By 2030.

Sleath added that the issue was in its infancy in the UK, but was gaining importance as the government sought to make the country technologically competitive with countries such as the US and China; this is a vision of a ‘British success story’.

Indeed, there is evidence that the country’s tech sector is currently stagnating. Research has revealed that the number of technology startups established in the UK has increased this year. It experienced its first “significant decline” since 2022. there was only 11,368 new technology startups in the third quarter A decrease of 11% compared to the figure of 13,073 in the first quarter of 2024.

TO SEE: UK Government Announces £32 Million Artificial Intelligence Project

UK finds data centers critical, putting pressure on Grid

Demand for data centers to facilitate AI training and expansion of cloud services hosting models is rapidly increasing worldwide. In September the government announced: data centers are now considered critical national infrastructure.

The government stated that this change was made as follows: help improve the country’s security As July’s report shows, it becomes increasingly important for the smooth functioning of essential services. CrowdStrike outage.

But it also means planning restrictions surrounding development have been relaxed so more could be given the green light, according to Ishmael Burdeau, the civil servant responsible for the government’s Net Zero strategy.

according to RecordHe said the designation allowed the government to “override local opposition to data centres”, which often stem from power and water consumption, noise and environmental destruction.

Shortly after, the government announced. four US technology companies The UK has committed to investing £6.3bn in data centres, providing the country with “the infrastructure needed to train and deploy the next generation of AI technologies”.

TO SEE: Microsoft Bets Big on UK AI with $3.2B Investment

Power demands could disrupt Europe’s environmental targets

Failure to meet the electricity demands of data centers could mean disaster for the environment. A Morgan Stanley report in September suggested the plants would produce 2.5 billion tons of carbon by the end of the decade, it was three times higher than if the productive AI boom had never occurred.

TO SEE: Sending an Email with ChatGPT is Equivalent to Consuming a Bottle of Water

In July, Google announced that the expansion of data centers to support artificial intelligence developments contributed to the company’s production. 14.3 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent in 2023. This represents an increase of 48% compared to the 2019 figure and a 13% increase since 2022.

The EU has a target to reduce the region’s greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. at least 11.7% lower than predicted In 2020, at the peak of being Climate neutral by 2050. But these goals may well be frustrated; A. Report published by McKinsey This week it was revealed that by 2030 the demand for flea warehouses in Europe will triple and their share of the region’s total energy demand will increase by 3%.

Like the UK, Europe faces challenges in generating the electricity needed for data centres.

“These include limited reliable power supplies, sustainability concerns, inadequate upstream infrastructure for energy access, land availability issues, shortages of power equipment used in data centers, and a shortage of skilled electrical trade professionals for building facilities and infrastructure,” McKinsey analysts wrote. .

Data centers don’t just need electricity to power servers; A significant portion of the energy also goes to cooling systems to manage the heat generated by the intensive hardware. Because AI chips require excessive processing power, they generate even more heat, so designers are asking equipment suppliers to lower the temperature of the water used for cooling.

Michael Winterson, president of the European Data Center Association, said: CNBC It said this week that lowering water temperatures would “basically take us back to the unsustainable situation we were in 25 years ago.”