The planning application for a two-story data center in Dublin, Ireland, has been withdrawn.
SDC Piperstown II Ltd submitted the application for a data center on a 20-acre site in Piperstown, Dublin, with Fingal County Council on January 17 2023. However, this has since been withdrawn with no reason provided. The company was not immediately available for comment.
The proposed building was to be located on lands north of Bay Lane at Piperstown, Dublin 11.
The application led to a number of objections, including by Social Democrat TD Róisín Shortall, who argued that the ‘antiquated electricity grid’ could not sustain further data centers.
Shortall said that: “In 2021, data centers accounted for 14 percent of all electricity demand in the State and EirGrid estimated that they could account for 29 percent by 2028. In the midst of an energy crisis, this level of usage must be stalled to protect our energy security.”
They added: “The energy consumption of these data centers is the equivalent of an additional 200,000 homes being powered,” and said that allowing the construction to go ahead would jeopardize the area's climate targets.
Further objections were filed on behalf of John Conway and Louth Environmental Group, claiming that the applicant failed to notify the Commission for Regulation of Utilities, and reinforcing concerns that the development would not comply with climate action obligations.
The application proposed the demolition of existing structures on the site, including a dwelling house and outbuildings, followed by the construction of a two-story data center building with a gross floor area (GFA) of 30,526 sqm (328,580 sq ft). The company also proposed to build an energy center building with a GFA of 7,834 sqm to house generators. The application also suggested that the energy center could act, in the future, as a grid-peaking plant.
Given the de-facto moratorium in Dublin, the proposal did not suggest connecting the data center to the grid until such time that EirGrid had confirmed it would be accepting new data center connections, something not expected until 2028.
Earlier today, DCD reported that 11 data centers in the Dublin area had been given access to the country’s gas network for power instead of the grid. It is not expected that more data center proposals will receive such contracts.
