The UK government has admitted it made a mess of approving a £1 billion hyperscale data centre near London, after confidently waving it through planning and hoping nobody would read the paperwork too closely.
The project, planned for a former landfill site in Iver, Buckinghamshire, was approved last year as part of Britain’s increasingly frantic data centre land grab. Ministers were keen to show they are “open for business”, even if that business involves vast slabs of concrete, enormous power demand, and awkward questions about water use.
In correspondence revealed during a legal challenge, the government conceded that it made a legal error when granting permission and that the approval should be scrapped.
Campaigners opposing the site took the government to the High Court, arguing that officials failed to properly assess the data centre’s environmental and energy impact. Given that hyperscale facilities consume power and water on an industrial scale, this was not a particularly wild claim.
Before granting approval, officials decided the project did not need a full environmental impact assessment, largely because the developer promised various mitigation measures, including the use of low-carbon energy. In a letter sent this week, the government admitted that this reasoning involved a “serious logical error” and that its justification was inadequate.
The developer, Greystoke, is not impressed. Its lawyers told the court that the original approval was perfectly lawful and that the government is now undermining its own decision. That argument will be tested later, as a judge has allowed the case to proceed to a full hearing.
This is an awkward moment for a government that has been aggressively backing data centres as part of its economic growth strategy. Ministers have already shown they are happy to override local councils, including on greenbelt land, when a large enough server farm is involved.
Most of the UK’s data centre capacity is already clustered around Greater London, which remains Europe’s largest data centre market. New hubs are emerging in Manchester, north-east England, and south Wales, as operators chase cheap land, available power, and planners willing to look the other way.
According to government estimates, around £45 billion of private investment has flowed into the UK data centre sector since mid-2024. Much of it comes from the usual suspects, including Amazon, Microsoft, and Google, which is currently building its first UK data centre in Hertfordshire.
Planning lawyers expect the government to revisit the Iver application and probably approve it again, this time with the paperwork done properly. That may satisfy the process, but it does nothing to calm local concerns about sustainability, grid strain, and water use.
