Edinburgh City Councilors have voted to put in place a moratorium on new data centres in the city today.
This report was covered in the following media (among other places)
At the Full Council meeting on 19th March, Edinburgh city councillors discussed the motion and heard a deputation from APRS. Her speech and written deputation in support of the motion are below.
The councillors voted: 51 for the motion and 10 for an amendment to wait until after any appeal should come through from the Gyle data centre developers.
Dr Kat Jones, Director of APRS, said:
“This is a very important result – it demonstrates the critical importance of having a proper definition of what a ‘green data centre’ is.
“Due to the very serious environmental impacts of hyperscale data centres, especially related to their energy and water use, unless there a meaningful, robust and scientifically coherent definition of what a ‘green data centre’ is, then it is impossible for Local Authorities to safely assess projects
“We are calling for the Scottish Government to urgently produce a well-considered, and rigorous definition of a green data centre. This definition would need to be properly consulted on, due to the environmental impacts of hyperscale data centres, as well as the impacts they would have on the grid, electricity prices, local countryside and communities, as well as our climate targets. We are also calling for hyperscale data centres to be put on schedule 1 of the EIA regulations.”
Deputation by APRS at the meeting
Question from Councillor Mumford
Second Question from Councillor
Council discussion and vote
The wording of the motion says:
A moratorium on ‘green’ data centres in Edinburgh
Agenda for City of Edinburgh Council on Thursday, 19th March, 2026, 10.00 am – Modern Council
Supporting Information:
- Green data centres are identified as a national development under NPF4.
- The Scottish Government provides no definition of what constitutes a green data centre, saying only ‘To be considered a green data centre, planning authorities may wish to consider criteria such as the extent to which the data centre is powered from renewable energy sources; makes use of energy efficient technologies; seeks to minimise water consumption; and supports the re-use of excess heat.’
- In January, the Planning Committee requested that the Planning Convener write to the Scottish Government seeking a definition of a green data centre, to inform future planning application determinations.
Proposed Action/Decision
Requests that Officers prepare a report for the next Full Council on whether it would be possible for Edinburgh Council to implement a moratorium on data centre applications until a definition or guidance exists – whether from Scottish Government or one adopted locally.
Further requests that officers engage with their counterparts within the Edinburgh and South East Scotland Region on how a moratorium may impact them and if there is potential for a cross-region moratorium
Spoken Deputation by APRS
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to give a deputation at this meeting. I am Kat Jones, the Director of Action to Protect Rural Scotland, a small countryside charity based in Edinburgh celebrating our centenary this year. We started looking into data centres back in October when we noticed applications for hyperscale data centres coming into planning authorities across the central belt, many in Green Belts (which is a particular priority area of work for us), going against the Local Development Plan, as in the Gyle situation, and also in agricultural and rural greenfield sites. With the vast amount of space they take up, and the almost unbelievable amounts of energy they take – the Gyle data centre would have used the energy of a quarter of a million households, it quickly became clear that it was vital that we intervened in this space. Both because of the impacts on our climate targets, and countryside and because of the knock on impacts for the massive amount of additional energy infrastructure that would be needed to support them.
I am here today to support the call for a moratorium on ‘green data centres’ in Edinburgh until a definition for a Green data centre exists. It is worth pointing out that the context for this is the hyperscale data centres which are the ‘major developments’ contained within the NPF4 National Development 12: Scotland’s fibre network, rather than data centres on the scale of our existing data centres which support our economic and societal life – the institutions: banks, universities, hospitals and of course the co-location data centres which oil the wheels of modern life.
It was clear at the planning meeting to decide on the hyperscale data centre at Edinburgh Park that the lack of a definition of what a green data centre was, proved to be a severe hindrance to decision making. Planning officials seemed to be leaning very heavily on one sentence, which came in answer to a written Parliamentary Question. This appears to be the only guidance that had come from the Scottish Government on the issue. One of the planning officials in the meeting when questioned said “The normal starting point when you are a planner, usually when you are at an appeal or an inquiry, is to go and look up the glossary of terms in the development plan.… unfortunately there isn’t [a definition], and all we really have is the most recent advice which is saying to local planning authorities: ‘you need to consider each case on its individual merits, and here are some of the factors or criteria that you would take into account’.”
It is clear that, before further decisions are made, it is vital that there is a definition of what a ‘green data centre’ actually is.
In order for a development to meet the bar for being considered part of National Development 12 it has to be considered both a ‘major development’ and a ‘green data centre’. Due to the very serious environmental impacts of hyperscale data centres, especially related to their energy and water use, unless there a meaningful, robust and scientifically coherent definition of what a ‘green data centre’ is, then it is impossible for Local Authorities to safely assess projects
APRS are pushing the Scottish Government to urgently produce a well-considered, and rigorous definition of a green data centre, with accompanying guidance for local authority planners and decision makers. Our view is that this definition would need to be properly consulted on, because of the importance of getting this right due to the environmental impacts of hyperscale data centres, as well as the impacts they would have on the grid, electricity prices, local countryside and communities, as well as our climate targets. We are also calling for hyperscale data centres to be put on schedule 1 of the EIA regulations.
Our view is that the factor most critical in whether a data centre could ever be considered ‘green’ is the scale of its energy use, as the climate impacts of the energy demand is something that gets much harder to mitigate for, as data centres get bigger and bigger, due to the 24/7 nature of the electricity demand, and the intermittent nature of renewables.
These hyperscale AI data centres are between ten and a hundred times the capacity of Scotland’s existing data centres and the energy they require, the pollution that would come from back-up diesel generation, give a challenge to make them ‘green’ or in any meaningful sense of the word. Solar panels, low flush toilets, LED lightbulbs and ‘heat network ready’ just won’t cut the mustard in the face of a building that will use the same amount of electricity as a quarter of a million homes.
The two planned data centres in Edinburgh would require more than a tenth of Scotland’s peak energy demand just for these two buildings, while creating extremely low numbers of jobs – around 29 jobs estimated for the Edinburgh park data centre. They are likely to be processing large language AI model data, presumably for a US tech company, with all benefits flowing offshore, while the environmental and community impacts are felt by the citizens of Edinburgh.
It is clear that, before further decisions are made, it is vital that there is a definition of what a ‘green data centre’ actually is.
I would like to support this call for a moratorium.
Written Deputation by APRS
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to give a deputation at this meeting. I am Kat Jones, the Director of Action to Protect Rural Scotland, a small countryside charity based in Edinburgh celebrating our centenary this year. We started looking into data centres in October 2025 when we noticed applications for hyperscale data centres coming into planning authorities across the central belt, many in Green Belts which is a particular priority area of work for us, and also in agricultural and rural greenfield sites. With the vast amount of space they take up (between a half and one kilometre squared) and the almost unbelievable amounts of energy they take – the Gyle data centre would have used the energy of a quarter of a million households, it quickly became clear that it was vital that we intervened in this space. Both because of the impacts on our climate targets, and countryside and because of the knock on impacts for the massive amount of additional energy infrastructure that would be needed to support them.
We are here today to support the call for a moratorium on ‘green data centres’ in Edinburgh until a definition for a Green data centre exists. It is worth pointing out that the context for this is the hyperscale data centres which are the ‘major developments’ contained within the NPF4 National Development 12: Scotland’s fibre network, rather than data centres on the scale of our existing data centres which support our economic and societal life – the institutions: banks, universities, hospitals and of course the co-location data centres which oil the wheels of modern life.
It was clear at the planning meeting to decide on the hyperscale data centre at Edinburgh Park that the lack of a definition of what a green data centre was, proved to be a severe hindrance to decision making. Planning officials seemed to be leaning very heavily on a sentence which came in answer to a Parliamentary Question, which appears to be the only guidance that had come from the Scottish Government on the issue. One of the planning officials in the meeting when questioned said “There isn’t a definition of a green data centre. The normal starting point when you are a planner, usually when you are at an appeal or an inquiry, is to go and look up the glossary of terms in the development plan.… unfortunately there isn’t [a definition], and all we really have is the most recent advice which is saying to local planning authorities: ‘you need to consider each case on its individual merits, and here are some of the factors or criteria that you would take into account’.”
It is clear that, before further decisions are made, it is vital that there is a definition of what a ‘green data centre’ actually is. Because, otherwise, it is impossible to know whether the element of ‘National Development 12’ should come into the decision making.
APRS are pushing the Scottish Government to urgently produce a well considered, meaningful and rigorous definition of a green data centre, with accompanying guidance for local authority planners and decision makers. Our view is that this definition would need to be properly consulted on, because of the importance of getting this right due to the vast environmental impacts of hyperscale data centres, as well as the impacts they would have on the grid, electricity prices, local countryside and communities, as well as our climate targets. We are also calling for hyperscale data centres to be put on schedule 1 of the EIA regulations.
Our view is that the factor most critical in whether a data centre could ever be considered ‘green’ is its size. These hyperscale AI data centres are between ten and a hundred times the size of Scotland’s existing data centres and the energy they require, emissions that would come from back-up generation, and water use, would make it extremely difficult to make them ‘green’ or ‘sustainable’ in any meaningful sense of the word.
The two planned data centres in Edinburgh would require 413MW of power between them, while creating extremely low numbers of jobs – around 29 jobs for the Edinburgh park data centre, and presumably similar for the Hermiston one. As AI data centres, they would be processing large language AI model data, presumably for a US tech company, with all benefits flowing offshore, while the environmental and community impacts are felt by the citizens of Edinburgh.
In contrast, the Edinburgh University supercomputer, with a capacity of 29MW, is the largest publicly funded data centre in the UK, and is doing vital public interest research, supporting hundreds of research jobs, creating spin-off enterprises, and educating the next generation of Scottish computer and research scientists. For a data centre this size there are far more options to be able to ‘green’ the facility and Edinburgh University are taking steps to do this.
It is vital that we have a definition of a green data centre before any other decisions are taken.
I would like to support this call for a moratorium.