The Northern Territory government is backing plans for a $40 billion data centre industry, with several ‘hyper-scale’ AI data centre campuses to be built on land around 30 kilometres from Darwin.
These data centres would be powered by 3 GW of electricity generation, which in turn would be powered by gas from the NT’s Betaloo Basin.
The plan puts the NT government at odds with the federal government, which has drafted rules that would force data centres to power their operations with new renewable energy sources.
The issue is expected to come to a head at a meeting of energy ministers this week, with the Queensland government publicly opposed to the renewable-only proposal, given a lack of modelling and clarity over how the plan would work.
source - MACROBUSINESS....by Leith van Onselen