1,000 signatures reached
To: Andy Burnham, Prime Minister
Ban new data centres that harm communities or climate
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Please stop Big Tech from building data centres that will harm the local community or the climate. We need you to:
- Ensure communities are properly consulted on, and consent to, new data centres - and provide them with the details they need to make an informed decision.
- Block any new, large-scale data centre unless the developer also builds new renewable energy and storage sufficient to power it completely.
- Ban the construction of any new data centres powered by fossil fuels.
- Ban the use of water-intensive cooling systems in new data centres.
Why is this important?
Big Tech companies are forcing hundreds of resource-intensive data centres through the UK’s planning system. Their colossal demand for electricity risks driving up bills for the rest of us and blocking the development of much-needed public priorities – like new housing. Without limits on their use of dirty fossil power and their use of water, these will cause serious harm to the places they are built – and the planet.
A single hyperscale data centre can use as much electricity as millions of homes, and produce greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to five international airports. If they use water for cooling, this can run to millions of litres a day.
The companies building data centres are the richest in the world. Join our call to stop them walking away with the profits while the rest of us pick up the social and environmental costs.
