Data centres are springing up all over the UK – using massive amounts of electricity and, in many cases, huge amounts of water.
The UK is already facing water shortages, high energy demand, a housing crisis and a climate crisis.
Meanwhile, data centres are sucking up the resources we all rely on. They’re competing with new homes for electricity, draining scarce water supplies and making heat and air pollution worse in communities already facing brutal heatwaves and poor air quality.
Despite all this, there are no clear rules to stop the demands of big tech being put ahead of people and the environment. No one seems to know how many data centres we actually need, how much energy and water they’ll use, or what their combined impact will be on our climate, nature and communities.
That’s not good enough.
Tell the UK government: put the brakes on data centre expansion until there's a proper plan to stop them draining our resources.