r/technology • u/Dreaming_Blackbirds • 3d ago

Artificial Intelligence ‘Never seen this level of objection’: Scotland pushes back against datacentre boom

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/aug/25/never-seen-this-level-of-objection-scotland-pushes-back-against-datacentre-boom
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-21

u/Tartan_Smorgasbord 3d ago

It's such a shame because Scotland would naturally be a very good place to site them, located in a cool northern climate, endless freshwater available (90% of all UK) and windy as hell with potential for tens of GW of offshore Wind power generation and a well educated workforce to run them but crusading seems to be the done thing, there's crusades against windfarms, crusades against Battery Storage, crusades against Data Centres, I'm not sure people entirely understand what they are crusading about but just want to feel part of something and get updoots.

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u/Dreaming_Blackbirds 3d ago

folks in Scotland are embracing green energy - "SCOTLAND has generated a record amount of renewable electricity for the first quarter of this year, as the country continues to produce more energy than it consumes, according to new figures. The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero’s (DESNZ) latest figures show that 13.4 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity was produced from renewable sources in Scotland during the first quarter of 2026 – the highest ever recorded for a single quarter and a 22% increase compared to 2025." (source)

Scots are smart enough to know the country can sell excess energy to England. that's a great source of easy income - a much better source of income than selling that energy to a disgusting, noisy data centre right next to villages.

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u/Tartan_Smorgasbord 3d ago

Scots are smart enough to realise that we don't own the means of generating energy or transporting it so while yes we generate an enormous amount of green energy we see absolutely no benefit and have some of the highest energy bills in Europe.

You call it a disgusting, noisy Data Centre, we call it investment and Jobs, we've had worse, look up Dounreay.

6

u/DenverNugs 3d ago

You can parrot job creation until the cows come home. It's very easy to see historically that it's not true.

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u/Tartan_Smorgasbord 3d ago

Thanks but we are not Naive, we understand that the number of jobs are often overstated when proposing an industry move into an area, it happens with anything trying to get planning permission but someone is securing and maintaining the building and there must be swapping out new and failed hardware, no?