How the Data Centre Industry is Tackling its Energy Problem

The data centre industry is changing faster than at any point in its history. And nowhere is that pressure felt more acutely than in the battle to secure enough energy to keep pace with soaring AI demand.

This subject was a central feature of the ‘AI Data Centre Debate’, one of the standout sessions at Data Centre LIVE: The London Summit, held in London on 19-20 May. 

The panel brought together Lonnie Salmon, Senior Director at Jabil, Jean-François Berche, CTO at GreenScale, Alex Bennett, CEO of NTT Global Data Centers, and Jamie Allen, Head of Site Selection at Iron Mountain – all ready to tackle the big issues.

Alex set the tone early, capturing the relentless pace of change the sector is navigating. "The rules have been rewritten and continue to be rewritten every three months," he said.

Nowhere is this more evident than in AI’s relationship with energy. With records for data centre size seemingly falling every two or three months, the sector is demanding a huge amount of power.

The question, now, is how to meet that demand.

The power problem runs deeper than generation

When the conversation turned to energy, the panel was broadly aligned: the UK does not have a shortage of generation capacity. The problem lies elsewhere.

"The UK can generate more electricity than it ever needs," said Lonnie. "The problem is not generating the power. The problem is getting it from point A to point B."

Jamie echoed that view. "We definitely have enough generation," he said. "I don't think anyone would say there's an issue with the amounts of electrons that are in the UK. It's just so strenuous to build that route down to where we actually need that power."

Part of that issue, according to the panel, is permitting, planning and regulation. 

Jean-François drew a pointed contrast with the US, where he lived and worked for several years. Stateside, the process of bringing power online is considerably more straightforward. 

"You go to Texas, you do a hole in the ground, you get gas, you power generation. Boom, done," he said. In the UK, that lead time is currently much longer.

Supply chains are straining under energy pressure

The energy challenge does not exist in isolation. For Lonnie, whose expertise lies in supply chains, the constraints feeding into the sector's power problem are themselves multiplying.

"Within this new environment of AI, the need for orchestration across the whole environment becomes paramount," he said.

Energy tops the list of critical shortages, but the knock-on effects run deeper. 

Semiconductor production – now accounting for around half of the industry's structural requirements – depends on helium, 40% of which comes from Qatar, according to Lonnie.

With the Strait of Hormuz closed, that supply chain is under strain. 

Can the sector square net zero with AI's energy appetite?

The sustainability question was perhaps the most charged of the session. The panel was candid about the difficulty of reconciling the industry's explosive growth with its environmental commitments.

Lonnie was blunt. "There's too much money in play," he said, acknowledging that while some governments – Ireland being a notable example – have moved to regulate data centre emissions, others may allow operators greater latitude in order to attract investment.

Alex outlined the targets NTT has set for itself: net zero across its data centres by 2030, offices by 2035 and supply chain by 2040. But he stopped short of suggesting the industry had found easy answers.

Jamie distilled the practical reality to a single word: compromise. 

Whether that means retrofitting carbon capture to gas generation or paying twice for power while waiting a decade or more for a grid connection, he said there is "not really much kind of in between".

The sector is moving, but so are the goalposts

The session closed without easy resolutions, which perhaps reflects where the industry finds itself. 

The energy challenge facing the data centre sector is not simply one of supply – it is one of infrastructure, regulation, geopolitics and time. 

Generation capacity may exist, but getting it to where it is needed, at the pace AI demands, remains a formidable task.

As Alex put it at the outset, the rules keep changing. The question is whether the grid – and the sector itself – can keep up.