Stop the hyperscale data centres – fight the tech billionaires

Socialist Party Scotland

Dozens of hyperscale data centres are currently being considered for construction in Scotland. This has already created big concerns among the local communities affected, not least because of the impact it will have on them.

So much so that the Scottish government has been forced to take limited action by instructing that planning authorities will have to notify the government within seven days if any proposed data centre construction is being considered. 

If they are built, they will consume vast amounts of electricity – estimated to be one and a half times the total peak electricity consumption across Scotland.  At the same time, they will also have to use colossal amounts of water to cool the process down – billions of gallons of water a day is likely. 

At a time of increasing temperatures leading to drought and water shortages globally – no wonder people are angry. With our own energy prices forever increasing – lining the pockets of the privatised energy companies – the real fear that these massive constructions will drive up energy costs is a genuine one.

The climate emergency is real – but these vast energy guzzlers will only make it worse. The paltry investments in renewables by governments and the privatised energy companies can’t match the demand that the hyperscalers will put on them. 

In Ireland, 22% of the country’s energy was used by data centres in 2024 (50% in Dublin). Data centres are undermining the country’s climate change targets and renewable energy, which should have displaced fossil fuel use, as per their projections, is being diverted to serving data centres.   

And let’s be clear – these data centres are not being built for public good. They are being financed and will be run for the benefit of the top – primarily US – tech companies who are investing hundreds of billions into AI technology. Not for the benefit of humankind – but for their own hoped-for profits.

Across the world – AI-related data centres are arousing mass community opposition, including across the US. New York recently became the first state in the US to impose a pause on new “hyperscale” data centres.

Who is building them?

Once data centres are built, they will be handed over often times to yet an unnamed tech corporation. You won’t see the names of the world’s richest tech giants in the planning applications. Instead, they often hide behind front organisations, private infrastructure developers, and to do their dirty work.

Unbelievably, the UK and Scottish government have been helping fund these data centres. Most recently, in the case of the DataVita AI data centre in Airdrie, where both the UK and Scottish governments are providing loans and funding for the construction. 

What can we do about it in Scotland? 

There are at least 24 hyperscale data centres being considered for construction across across Scotland. Get organised.

Set up a local public meetings to organise your community. Apply political pressure – write to, lobby MSPs, MPs and councillors and demand they take a stand in opposition.

Demand the Scottish government halt their 2021 action plan and insist that it and local councils impose a moratorium on further planning permission for construction. 

Link up the campaigns across Scotland, and indeed internationally, to learn from each other, share experiences and unite the struggles against this corporate vandalism. 

Do the hyperscale data centre create jobs?

In the construction of them there will be temporary jobs created – but in the running of the data centres, negligibly few. In truth, in the hands of the multi-national hyperscalers like Google, Amazon, Microsoft and others, millions of jobs are already beginning to be lost through the implementation of AI.

Surely we need AI? 

We say, rather than make millions unemployed, the use of AI technology could be used to cut the working week with no loss of pay, rather than throw skilled workers on the scrap heap. Why not use the advances in technology to plan the running of economy and society based on human need not for corporate greed? 

What’s socialism got to do with it?

But that would require bringing the hyerpscalers, alongside the banks and other major industries into public ownership. Which is why we need to build a political voice that argues for these types of socialist policies.

As it is the massive corporate investments into AI have created a bubble that will inevitably burst. When it does burst, it will have devastating consequences on the world economy, from Scotland, to the US to China and across the world. And those who created the crisis, the billionaires, will expect us to pay the price through job losses and cuts to our living standards and even worse public services.

That’s why Socialist Party Scotland says the fight against the data centres is a fight against capitalism itself and for a socialist future.

• Socialist Party Scotland Public Meeting
• Oppose the AI data centre for Chapelcross, Annan
• Saturday 12 September 1.30pm
• St George’s Hall, Dumfries