Today, Friends of the Earth launched its new ‘The Cost of Data Centres’ report. The report finds that high data centre energy demand and dependence on gas generated electricity in the Irish market is creating substantial additional electricity costs for households in Ireland.
Friends of the Earth found that, due to the impact of data centres on electricity demand and prices, households paid an average of an additional €263 for their electricity in 2021 to 2023.
This afternoon Electric Ireland announced that it will increase electricity charges by 8 per cent and its gas charges are to increase by 7.7 percent. It is estimated that these increases will cost many households an additional €250 a year.
People Before Profit’s Councillor Conor Reddy has repeated the party’s call for a moratorium on data centre development and for price controls to reduce electricity prices for households.
Councillor Reddy said:
“On the day that Friends of the Earth published a report detailing the substantial extra electricity costs imposed by data centres on Irish households, it was announced that Electric Ireland is to increase electricity and gas prices by 8 percent and by 7.7 per cent respectively.
“This data centre levy on households’ electricity costs is a heavy price of successive governments letting data centres proliferate and consume ever increasing volumes of electricity, driving up prices for households.
“Data centres consume more electricity than every urban household in the state combined. Now we have learned from Friends of the Earth that Irish households have paid an average of €263 extra for electricity over the 2021 to 2023 period because of data centres pushing up electricity prices.
“In addition, the growth in greenhouse emissions driven by data centre proliferation is also a large part of the reason why Ireland is getting nowhere near achieving its emissions reductions targets for 2030.
“The consequences of data centre growth are financially unacceptable and environmentally unsustainable.
“Friends of The Earth also found that even ambitious expansion of renewable energy will not be enough to offset the price effects of the increased electricity demand from continuing rapid data centre growth. There is no alternative - data centre demand for electricity must be suppressed.
“While this government and the previous government let data centre growth run wild, moratoriums on data centre development are spreading in the US, as local communities resist the impact of data centres on water and electricity supplies and prices, and on their environment. Last month, the US State of Maine endorsed a moratorium on building large data centres.
“The Irish government’s industrial policy is highly irresponsible and completely unsustainable. The slavish serving of the interests of big US tech at the expense of ordinary people and our environment must stop.
“We need an immediate moratorium on new data centre development to reduce electricity demand, and we need price controls to reduce electricity prices for households.”
For a helpful map on of data centres in Ireland: https://www.datacentermap.com/ireland/dublin/