Kildare Co Council seeks moratorium on building data centres
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KILDARE County Council will write to two government ministers calling for a national moratorium on new data centre development after a Labour Party-led group called for the move.
At the October meeting of Kildare County Council, five of the six Labour councillors in the county (with cllr Pat Balfe being the exception), along with cllr Noel Connolly of Sinn Féin and cllr Bill Clear of Independent Ireland, proposed that the council ‘writes to the minister for climate, energy and the environment and the minister for housing, local government and heritage seeking the introduction of a national moratorium on new data centre development until a public consultation process has been undertaken and national planning guidelines for data centres have been prepared and published’.
The seven councillors are of the view that the guidelines should assess where data centres are located, their impact on local communities and infrastructure, their water and energy use, and their climate and biodiversity effects. The guidelines should also consider whether developments provide benefits to local areas and make use of technologies such air-cooling technology, they say.
After a discussion in the council chamber, it was agreed that the letters would be issued to the ministers.
Cllr Breslin told the : “At this moment in time, there’s no regulation on them, and it’s a free-for-all with them”.
She also noted that data centres account for a large share of Ireland’s energy consumption, and that “most of them are using fossil fuel”.
She continued: “We have to give the regulator the power to demand clean energy and limit greenhouse gases from them. And the only way to do that at this moment in time, we believe, is a moratorium, and we fully support the motion in relation to that.”
The Athy councillor said that the motion was consistent with Labour Party policy and public statements, after TD Ciarán Ahern brought a bill before the Dáil seeking a moratorium and cllr Breslin herself expressed support for a moratorium at the September meeting of the council.
At that meeting, cllr Breslin did not support two motions seeking a review of data centre zoning in Naas. This was after a large crowd of Naas locals turned out in force ahead of the meeting, urging the council to overturn the zoning, citing concerns such as the environmental impact of data centres, and noise and air pollution.
Cllr Breslin instead noted that the Naas Local Area Plan is set to expire in December 2027 and said it was her party’s belief that motions for land rezoning should be addressed as part of a review of that plan. Speaking to the , she reacted to criticism of Labour’s stance.
“And I suppose, look, there was a comment made in relation to the previous council meeting about the Labour Party stance, but the Labour Party stance on the zoning is that there is a mechanism to look at for dezoning and rezoning of land, and that should have been looked at for that data centre in Jigginstown.”
She said that a comment was made to her by a Social Democrat councillor, who said that the Labour Party had changed its view on data centres.
Cllr Breslin had a clear message: “We don’t support data centres. We’re very clear we don’t support data centres. But there was a mechanism which could have been used and should have been used for looking at dezoning land.”
