Campaigners call for Amsterdam to pull plug on giant data centre

More than 500 people have joined a campaign to stop a huge data centre being built in Amsterdam-Zuid, arguing that it will bring “zero benefits to the area”.

The Dutch government has introduced restrictions on the size of data centres in recent years following criticism from provincial and municipal governments about the strain on the electricity network. Data centres accounted for 4.6% of all electricity use in the Netherlands in 2024.

But the plans to build a 24,000 m2 facility on Amsterdam’s Science Park were submitted by US firm Equinix before the ban, which only applies to new developments, took effect in 2022.

Local residents have also become increasingly vocal in opposing the construction of data centres, while campaign groups Geef Tegengas and Extinction Rebellion both staged demonstrations this summer against a Microsoft project in Amsterdam Sloterdijk.

“There are already enough data centres to keep everything running. This is becoming overkill,” Dylan Bakker of Stop Datacenter Zuidoost told NOS.

Amsterdam city council, which wants to build 8,000 homes in Zuidoost to help relieve the national housing shortage, has attached extra conditions to the site, such as requiring the residual heat from the plant to be used for domestic heating.

Water and electricity

There are also concerns about the strain on water supplies, which have been exacerbated by the summer drought. Equinix said in its planning application that it would need 274 million litres of water a year for the first stage of the project, rising to more than a billion litres when the data centre is complete in 2036.

But the municipality says it would face legal action and penalties if it tore up the permit to build the data center at this stage.

Equinix has said it will only build one of four planned 60-metre data towers initially, until electricity grid operator Tennet can supply enough power.

Tennet warned earlier this year that the network was nearing capacity, leading to a six-month moratorium on new connections in Utrecht.

The complete campus in Zuidoost will consume 779 kWh of electricity a year, almost as much as all the households Amsterdam combined, which currently use 869 kWh.

Michiel Eielts, director of Equinix Benelux, argued that the data centres were an essential part of modern infrastructure. “Every house needs the internet. We need data centres for the growth of our companies, our public services and our security,” he said.