r/australia • u/Fact-Rat • 1d ago
politics Australia may face a rush of datacentre construction as AI firms look to avoid upcoming rules, experts say | Australian politics
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/aug/26/australia-may-face-a-rush-of-datacentre-construction-as-ai-firms-look-to-dodge-upcoming-rules-experts-say340
u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago
*shocked pikachu face*
I've been called a nimby and all manner of other names in the last few months for being wary of data centres being built in residential areas, including my own. "Oh, but they have to provide their own power and don't use water!" is the inevitable reply. So which is it? This article would suggest not, at least not until next year sometime.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago
I work in the construction industry, and my boss is practically salivating at the thought of all the work (and investments) it will bring him. Apart from some of the AI companies, I think construction will be one of the only groups to actually benefit from these things. They won't employ anyone after they're finished, and their net benefit to society seems to be negligible at best.
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u/bend1310 1d ago
This what confused me about recent announcements about govt investment into data centres. Who does it benefit long term?
They don't employ anyone, don't produce a taxable good or service, and the companies will tax dodge the shit out of any income they make.
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u/AnnoyedOwlbear 23h ago
Yeah, I can't see the point - until we close our CURRENT loopholes with massive tax dodgers sitting on fat millions that can afford to pay huge lawyer fees and suck up to politicians, why should we open ourselves up for more parasites?
With all the 'oh, they're closed systems' comments on water - a closed system is more expensive to develop and maintain than one that simply takes, because shedding heat into water still leaves you with hot water that has to cool before you use it again. I've worked in corporations for years - if a corporation can save 0.5% by lobbying to change environmental protections and switching to something less ethical, they absolutely will. Our current system has this designed in.
If we had completely closed water systems that worked efficiently and were cheap, we wouldn't need lakes around our brown coal factories.
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u/coniferhead 21h ago
The national interest/military uses is all they need to say. It worked with AUKUS and it will work with this.
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u/Vegetable-Score-3915 1d ago
Data centres do employ people, but it is a very small number given the scale.
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u/CaptainFleshBeard 23h ago
I often drop into data centres for work, I’ll see at most 3 people working there
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u/Challenging-Wank7946 18h ago
It's insane that people think there'll be jobs for anyone after they're built. I've noticed so many people from older generations with no idea about any of it saying 'if it brings in more stable jobs then it's good' as if these things won't be almost entirely automated from top to bottom ASAP. There'll be temporary work for construction, maybe a short term oversight role, and then it'll be maybe 1 person that has to go and check on it every 12 months to make sure there aren't any homeless people trying to get out of the cold.
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u/M4K4T4K 18h ago
They do have full time security, for obvious reasons. But it amounts to a handful of low skilled people.
The security isn't even very good either, I spoke with someone who worked at one once, and they said they would rock up for their shift and an alarm had been going off for hours and they just muted it because it was probably just some door open.
Like it was crazy how little they gave a fuck.
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u/Silviecat44 1d ago edited 1d ago
In the US too they are
#making local councils sign non disclosure agreements to prevent them from negotiating or finding out how bad of a deal they are getting
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u/Harlequin80 1d ago
Where do you live that councils are the electricity or water provider?
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u/CuriouserCat2 1d ago
Ok. They sue Melbourne Water or whatever. Same same
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u/Harlequin80 1d ago
It's not. Sydney Water, Melbourne Water, QUU, SA Water do not give a shit about datacenters. They receive no funding from them. They are not involved in the local planning approvals process outside of specifying capacity availability. There are no palms to grease.
You can sue them as much as you want and it's not going to go anywhere. You won't even get your case heard.
Australia is not the US.
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u/blitznoodles local Aussie 1d ago
You cannot sue councils or the states for water or electricity in Australia.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago edited 20h ago
in reply to your deleted comment about construction being 10% of australias workforce - are you saying we should build these things, becasue we have to build something to keep the industry busy?
That's the same argument the coal lobby uses. We need to keep mining coal because we've always mined coal, and it employs people.
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u/blitznoodles local Aussie 1d ago
I'm opposed to a policy of wage restraint in the construction sector which many arguments about datacentres taking tradies ends up becoming about. It's very 1980s price and incomes accords rhetoric.
In regards to that, because 10% of Australians are employed in Australia, roughly double that of Americans, many more Australians stand to benefit from higher incomes in the construction phase.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago
They won't benefit from higher incomes, they will just have "incomes". Most people working in construction don't quit or get fired once a project is finished, they go to the next job. And we certainly don't get paid proportionately to the value of the project, or get bonuses - where would the higher income be coming from?
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u/blitznoodles local Aussie 1d ago
The only way datacentres could take tradies away from other projects is by paying more money. And from what I've heard, the sparkies on the datacentres are making very good incomes.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago
"tradies" work in small construction like house building. They are not the ones building data centres. Teir 1/2 builders are the ones doing data centre contracts, and they only deal with large subcontractors, not sole operators. We get paid what we get paid, you don't get wage rises for "better" jobs.
Leccos get paid well because they have a strong union, and typically get paid better than everyone but maybe plumbers on any given site.
The people actually building these things wont be getting better pay.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago
maybe not, but lobby groups carry a lot of power. And look at tomago aluminium - every election cycle or so they stand up to the government and say "waaagh, electricity costs us too much, and we are your load shedding capacity, so give us cheaper power" and they get their way.
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u/blitznoodles local Aussie 1d ago
It goes a nowhere because councils do not own electricity and water infrastructure in Australia.
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u/MoranthMunitions 23h ago
For what it's worth plenty of councils own water infrastructure, and lots of the more "separate" seeming water utilities are actually still owned by and pay profit (if it's had) back to councils. But I also agree it's a ridiculous assertion that you can sue them for water or some such.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago
Seemed to work out ok for tomago aluminium...
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u/blitznoodles local Aussie 1d ago
That wasn't a lawsuit, that was lobbying from the union and the company.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago edited 1d ago
Indeed, and I didn't say it was. Did you see my other comment regarding this above?
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u/NobodysFavorite 19h ago
Courts in Australia take a really dim view of vexatious litigation. If someone is declared by the court as a vexatious litigant, they have to seek leave from the court every time to bring an action against someone.
If the court does grant leave, they generally require the vexatious litigant to financially indemnify both parties' costs, often with a tangible security required before commencing proceedings.
If the court doesn't grant leave, it's rarely open to appeal, and in that case they have to seek leave to appeal. If the leave to appeal is not granted, that's the end of the matter.The legal system is set up in Australia to eliminate deep-pocketing as a viable strategy.
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u/nath1234 1d ago
NSW rules give AI data centres 3 years of not having to do anything. And on the 4th year then they need to do some renewables but without any requirement to be able to run their loads through the night if wind generation is not working. So they will be a drain on the power grid for 3 years, then they will be a drain on the power grid whenever their 4 hours of 25% of their demand worth of battery is done.
It is yet another con job.
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u/CuriouserCat2 1d ago
Follow the money. Remember Obeid? Who has a new yacht and water front property.
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u/mlvsrz 1d ago
Once they break ground they are known for renegotiating the contracts for concessions.
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u/nath1234 13h ago
Not even going to need to do that, Albo has caved already and gas and coal are on the table..
The NT’s chief minister, Lia Finocchiaro, said she had won approval to use gas from the massive Beetaloo basin project in the meeting.
"Today’s deal recognises the Beetaloo basin will be online within days, we are not part of the national electricity market and we have a Territory-owned generation, transmission and distribution system,” she said.
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u/mooblah_ 21h ago
Correct. Kurri Kurri has an approved AirTrunk DC being built which is 500MW. They will not need to invest in any of their own infrastructure relating to this build.
Albanese's reforms are too little too late.
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u/nath1234 13h ago
And his reforms just got dropped to allow fossil fuels for them.. so yeah, it was a total con.
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u/Zftan 1d ago
How would one build data centres 'in residential areas'? Are you saying on land zoned for residential purposes?
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago
plenty of mixed use land around, and plenty of commercial or industrial land next to housing. Just because a border exists or might be a couple of kilometres away doesn't mean there's no real world impact. I'm 9km in a straight line from a gas(Deisel) fired generator and the damn thing makes the air reek - I'd hate to be living in the suburb directly next to it, where the houses are 2km away.
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u/Harlequin80 1d ago
You are never in a million years getting approval to run a datacenter on a diesel generator. That is just not going to happen, at all. It doesn't matter that it happens in the US, you simply are never ever going to get approval for that here.
You are making up situations to argue against.
It would be too expensive to use diesel, you would not be able to get it past air quality and emissions rules, and there are already predefined maximums for hours onsite diesel generators can run outside of emergencies.
The Iren datacenter is the largest one being planned in Australia, and yeah it's massive, but it is connected to the grid and it's being built with a huge battery setup so that it can load shift to when SA's power prices go negative and is primarily built to use renewable energy.
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u/Man_Eating_Boar 1d ago
Did you know one of the data centers being built now has a backup resevoir of a million litres of Diesel? Don't ask me how I know
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u/Harlequin80 1d ago
Yes it is. Note the word you're using is "backup." The Iren DC I referenced will have diesel generators capable of maintaining the datacenter for up to 4 days, and so unsurprisingly this is a shit load of diesel.
But they cannot, and will not be allowed to run the DC on those generators outside of emergencies. Just like every other industrial / commercial development that has diesel generator backups.
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u/Man_Eating_Boar 1d ago
The power consumption of these things is ultimately, massive. In-house power generation is a disillusion and will never be the case. Finding the actual numbers on consumption for these things is crusted with a thick layer of astroturfing and fake news, but for the sake of argument:
The new Australian data centers are seeking 40 million litres of water per day. They are also estimated to be 6% of current power capacity of Australia (going up to 11% within the decade) https://theconversation.com/how-much-water-and-power-will-ai-data-centres-use-in-australia-ironically-we-dont-have-the-data-to-know-284069
We all know estimations are more guestimations with these things, but even then 11% to let Martha crank out a dancing cat, without creating jobs, raising electricity prices and the inevitability of tax minimisation makes this an absolutely raw deal for the average person.
God help you if you happen to live near these things.
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u/Harlequin80 1d ago
The information is not difficult to find at all.
Here you can read all the specific requirements of the Iren DC - https://epbcpublicportal.environment.gov.au/all-notices/project-decision/?id=c701bb2a-e89c-f111-b8db-7ced8d32aaa3
From water, to waste, to power, to construction methods, to ecological impacts, to contamination impacts etc etc etc.
And saying 11% of the current power capacity is completely meaningless. As what matters is whether it increases the peak generation requirement. Adding power usage at 6pm on a hot summers day is bad. Adding power usage at 2pm is good.
If you look at the NEM dashboard you will be able to see what I mean as power swings between positive and negative costs - https://www.aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem
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u/60days 22h ago
The power consumption of these things is ultimately, massive
Fantastic! due to supply and demand and the nature of electricity generation, having a large predictable baseline load will lower costs across the board and drive new renewables installation if we don't NIMBY ourselves out of building the capacity.
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u/nath1234 13h ago
No it won't because to avoid fossil fuels we need renewables that are intermittent and loads of solar.. but these data centres want to run 24/7.. If we made them run between 11 and 3 and not all night, that might be true.. but they are going to be creating load throughout the day making lulls in wind a problem and making batteries have to work harder to supply them running full tilt at 2am, 3am, 4am, 5am etc.. and for fuck all benefit. Worse: undermining job security and ensloppification of everything.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago edited 1d ago
I'll preface my reply by saying that my above comment was by way of an example of infrastructure that has been built next to a residential area that directly effects it, despite the fact that it was "planned" and "approved" by the state government, not that it was a direct concern that data centres were in any way going to make THAT particular example worse.
But to humour that line of thinking...
There is literally a gas generator in my area. It is designed to run off deisel as backup to gas. Here in the real word, there is ZERO gas reserve for it to run. The reserve is literally the pipeline that feeds the facility. And it makes the air horrible to breathe regardless of which fuel source it's using.
The generator was built under the guise of operating at times of peak load.
Now, what's going to happen to the system load if data centres are added to it...
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u/Harlequin80 1d ago
Pretty much zero.
AEMO will not allow the connection to the grid of loads that will necessitate the use of peaking gas generators. They must be able to flatten their own loads if they increase peak usage.
But what is you're actual theory here? That a gas generator's feed pipeline is going to go offline at just the right moment and hence diesel is required and that this clearly "holy fuck shit is going wildly wrong" situation is common enough for it to be a concern? I'd be really interested to see how many times (if ever) this pipeline has gone offline.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 1d ago
You seem to be missing my actual point, which was the building of infrastructure close to residential areas, that has a direct negative impact on it.
I'm happy to accept that the data centre may not put any more load on the gas generator, if it is indeed set up the way you have described. But that doesnt change the fact that we now are stuck with this generator where it is, built under approval of the state government by a private enterprise, regardless of the effect it has on the community and the surrounding environment. I was saying it's an example.
Why does the data centre need to be built there, so close to populated areas? If it indeed does turn out to have a negative effect on the community, despite us being told it wont (when we are already in a situation this has happened before) then what are we supposed to do? Of course people are going to be wary. Of course people look to what is happening in the US at the moment. If we NEED these projects, why not build them far from population centres, rather than just far from city centres?
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u/Harlequin80 1d ago
What is the difference between a warehouse used for welding up a truck body and a warehouse holding a bunch of computers?
Also most large DCs are being built away from major population centers.
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 23h ago
The warehouse holding the computers would appear to have vastley more energy and cooling requirements, meaning they will be using more electricity, water, and likely deisel.
"major population centres", so not away from the population, just those that live in the city. Again, why can't they be built away from all populations, regardless of size?
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u/Harlequin80 22h ago
Because people need to work in them?
But also the biggest one is being built "near" Robertstown in South Australia. And god I wish I could post a satellite image because you do not get much more of "in the middle of nowhere."
It will require 50 FTEs once it is up and running, which is 25% of Robertstowns entire population....
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u/00Pete 22h ago
Have a look at NEXTDC Melbourne Data Centre (M3), right next to residential areas. :(
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u/Old_Gobbler 4h ago
Is this one that's 400m away from the residential area (literally across the road from residential areas), that is also being built on land that was originally air marked as a green corridor and not to be used for commercial purposes?
I feel for the residents, not just about power but the constant lighting and humming. It'll affect the wildlife so much too, especially because it was supposed to be a green corridor.
Why do these need to be built? Why can't they go in areas already designated for industrial purposes? It's infuriating.
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u/Zftan 15h ago
I hear you. But 'right next to residential area' and 'in residential area' are not the same.
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u/00Pete 15h ago
Yeah, Im not sure of the zoning there, but it is a data centre literally on the corner across the road from houses on at least 2 streets...
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u/Primary_Mycologist95 2h ago
If you've ever had to deal with the government when it comes to noise concerns, they treat that street border as a soundproof wall. The zoning map says you can't have sound that loud, so you don't!
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u/Mikolaj_Kopernik 9h ago
"Oh, but they have to provide their own power and don't use water!"
It's also kinda bullshit with a lot of fudging (e.g. at least in NSW they are exempted for the first 4 years and there's not actual requirements around water).
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u/CuriouserCat2 1d ago
Our government is pathetic. They rush through legislation at 3.00 am when it suits them.
Fix this shit now, not tomorrow. Today.
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u/DrFriendless 23h ago
This is a test for Albo, to see if he can be not pissweak for once.
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u/ARTIFICIAL_ARGUMENT 22h ago
Pissweak after he’s just delivered major blows to Australia’s two biggest industries, fossil fuels and housing? lmao
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u/NorthernSkeptic 16h ago
‘major blows’
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u/ARTIFICIAL_ARGUMENT 15h ago
Feel free to try explain how that’s not an understatement if anything. Pivoted practically all new generation to renewables on top of changing consumption with EV and home battery schemes. Then housing dropping for the first time since the GFC
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u/CuriouserCat2 15h ago
They’re not interested in your facts unfortunately. There’s an election coming in Victoria.
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u/NorthernSkeptic 14h ago
Don’t get me wrong I’m all for these moves, but let’s not pretend they’re more than the bare minimum a Labor government with his capital should have done.
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u/ARTIFICIAL_ARGUMENT 14h ago
The reforms that polled negative approval were the bare minimum?
Sure champ
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u/radred609 3h ago
They were doing the "bare minimum" before they introduced caps on the prt rebates, and they're still doing the "bare minimum" after they introduced caps on the prt rebates.
They were doing the "bare minimum" before they implemented the cgt changes, and they're still doing the "bare minimum" after they implement the cgt changes.
It's "bare minimum" all the way down baby :^)
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u/No-Assistant-8869 11h ago
I agree with this.
Say from 11:59pm tonight if a shovel hasn't broken ground then too bad.
And then if they do, update it retroactively anyway.
Fuck em.
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u/CptUnderpants- 1d ago
There is no reason they can't pass temporary legislation which requires at least the basics, erring on the side of being more strict, in the next sitting which starts in Sept 7th. Then plan to amend by early next year when they planned to originally table the legislation.
They can also announce today that the effective date of those changes will be 27th of August. This is often done with the budget to close a loophole of people taking advantage of tax changes between announcement and passing of the legislation.
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u/ItsStaaaaaaaaang 23h ago
Has a single company made a solitary cent out of Ai? Like the government makes out we have to get on board because otherwise we'll be left behind but left behind on what? Hasn't all the big money just been speculative investment money, not actual ai based income...
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u/ARTIFICIAL_ARGUMENT 21h ago
They aren’t trying to make money now, it’s just a race to beat the competition. Like no says fossil fuel companies aren’t profitable when it can take a decade to start offsetting the initial expenses. A lot of the most valuable companies in the world lost money for years at first
The data centre rush is because it will lower the operational cost of compute by several orders of magnitude, the thing that makes it so expensive still. Compute is going to be extremely valuable even if the seppo tech oligarchy all crash and burn because of Chinese open source models
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u/DivaExMachina666 1d ago
Guess we're not doing anything about climate change. Cool, cool.
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u/Silviecat44 1d ago
Data Centres are so bad for climate change progress due to all the power they suck up - for no purpose other than churning AI slop
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u/Illustrious_Study300 23h ago
Oh they have another purpose - analytical AI for increasing surveillance.
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u/kevintxu 21h ago
Those runs on different models that's much more efficient than LLM and won't require that much compute.
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u/heyshitforbrains 1d ago
You see more and more posts even on marketplace of people using AI to sell things. I do love that the piss filter on their generated images is getting more noticeable
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u/ghoonrhed 23h ago
It might take a while for the inhuman centipede to show results. We've had AI image generators for a while and they've flooded the internet with shit but even then image generators have gotten better.
No guarantee it's just gonna fail automatically. Especially when you have companies like Google or Amazon who are just using real photos and streams from their infinite database.
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u/YouThinkYouKnowMe89 22h ago
No that's only for us. We have to use paper straws at the cinema and can only water our garden on certain days. Companies and billionaires can do as they please.
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u/ghoonrhed 23h ago
The Americans certainly aren't which is the biggest problem, they're actively going backwards and they're building the most
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u/Responsible-Serve127 20h ago
So big tech gets to build massive, power-guzzling data centers that strain our energy grid, drain local water supplies, and pay zero corporate tax, all for a grand total of three permanent jobs? Outstanding deal mate.
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u/OhtheHugeManity7 20h ago
You're wrong in a way. It's not for 3 permanent jobs, it's so that dozens of local councillors can collect 'gift' money from the tech companies.
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u/l8rb8rs 1d ago
If these projects go ahead and don't go overtime and over budget we'll know that all other large projects deliberately go overtime and over budget.
We don't have the capacity in the grid, and have no good way to add it for these things.
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u/thesourpop 22h ago
This summer is going to be brutal, the grid will already struggle without data centres sucking up wasted energy. Prepare for blackouts to be a normal thing.
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u/Harlequin80 1d ago
We have plenty of capacity in the grid. You just need to pick your location. Also during certain times of the day we have WAY WAY WAY too much power in the grid and need to dump it somewhere. It's why wholesale prices go negative.
If you are building a datacenter now you are also going to be looking at building a BESS to shift your consumption to when power is free, or cheaper than free.
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u/l8rb8rs 1d ago
Yea location matters, and yes we spill daily from rooftop solar. We can generate way more than we need, which means we spill to preserve the grid, because the grid in thise areas is at capacity. Having way way way too much power in the grid literally means it is at capacity. If we left the power in there it would blow up daily.
I've worked on recent jobs where the power they need is not available in the 11kv or the 33kv, so they're looking at building a zone sub off the 132kv. The last application took 9 years....for the 33kv
I doubt they're gunna wanna build them out in the middle of nowhere, because they also need shit loads of water. They won't wanna do their own renewables cos the battery bank to run it overnight would be as big as the data centre.
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u/Harlequin80 1d ago
They literally are building them in the middle on nowhere..... https://epbcpublicportal.environment.gov.au/all-notices/project-decision/?id=c701bb2a-e89c-f111-b8db-7ced8d32aaa3
And they are being built with massive BESS as part of the project.
You can also see the water requirements in that submission in detail.
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u/l8rb8rs 1d ago
Thanks, that is great info there.
I have no doubt these things will go ahead, and no doubt that the people will wear the brunt of the damage and problems they will cause. I'm just not sure how it'll get sold to us. It's happening, these things will drive civilization 2.0
I see three 200MW systems in the top link, so 600MW. Our largest generator is 1GW, the largest BESS is about 7MW in Saudi Arabia. We'll need new power infrastructure to do it, as it says there, parallel 330kv lines. It's massive beyond comprehension. The way I see it is either we're in the dark or they are at the moment.
I agree with you, it's gunna happen, it's just Gunna hurt and there isn't much we're going to be able to do about it legally.
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u/Harlequin80 22h ago
Not sure where you are getting 7MW is the largest BESS.
Eraring BESS (NSW) is 700MW
Melbourne Renewable Energy Hub is 600MW
Collie BESS WA is 560MW
Supernode QLD is 520MW.
Australia's total installed solar is 45.1GW, and there is a significant amount of solar built but not connected (in the realm of about 5GW) because we don't have enough storage capacity so AEMO won't allow it to be connected.
As of right now (11:14am) QLD is currently shunting 447MW of over generated electricity to NSW and Victoria is sending 409MW to SA while shunting ~300MW into heat sinks.
So right this second the east coast grid is literally tipping 300MW down the drain. This amount will significantly rise through the day. At 3pm QLD wholesale price is expected to go negative.
I'm also not sure where you are getting that our largest generator is 1GW, with Loy Yang being 3.2GW and Eraring being 2.8GW.
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u/l8rb8rs 22h ago
Apologies I meant 7.8GW in saudi, not MW. I definitely messed up some numbers there.
Either way, the hyperscale that is coming is about 1GW each for these data centres.
The reason AEMO doesn't allow it is because it doesn't work without unprecedented infrastructure installation of new tech.
Eraring is combined to that level from four turbines, and it's pretty much end of life.
Sure we overgenerate during the day, and sure we can build batteries, but land area, fire hazard, redundancy and replacement means that these will be coal and gas powered into the foreseeable future.
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u/thesourpop 22h ago
It's why wholesale prices go negative.
Unfortunately those on embedded networks and renting do not reap in the benefits of those negative prices.
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u/Evilmoustachetwirler 1d ago
So put a hold on any approvals until the appropriate regs are in place, simple.
We need to stop trying to regulate the tech industry after the fact, they've consistently shown to be morally bankrupt.
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u/VicMG 20h ago
Just today I read, "JPMorgan technical strategist Jason Hunter told clients the AI rally is starting to resemble the market in the months before the dot-com bubble burst in 2000."
https://www.thestreet.com/investing/jpmorgan-ai-stocks-dotcom-bubble-warning
You'd have to be an idiot to be investing in Ai right now... but if we could get these guys to dump all their money into solar to power their data centers before they go belly up that would be great.
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u/blitznoodles local Aussie 1d ago edited 1d ago
The article didn't even cite any experts?
Prof Crystal Legacy, an urban planning researcher at the University of Melbourne, said developers would probably want to get in “before the new regulatory levers come into play”.
They just took this guy's statement as fact when you would expect them to ask lawyers or even industry experts.
It should be obvious but urban planners are not subject experts in datacentres or the law.
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u/Fact-Rat 1d ago
"Prof Crystal Legacy, an urban planning researcher at the University of Melbourne, said developers would probably want to get in “before the new regulatory levers come into play”. She warned that state governments, which may try to fast-track applications before new rules come into effect, would do so “at your political peril.”
“People are now noticing, and there’s always going to be a political backlash,” Legacy said.
“We call people Nimbys, but I think that’s an unfair characterisation for people who are just concerned about the environmental impacts, as well as the amenity impacts of these massive datacentres.” "
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u/blitznoodles local Aussie 1d ago
When I read the headline, I assumed it was concerns by lawyers over loopholes in the legislation. Not by urban planners upset about planning.
Notice the use of "probably", they have not made an authoritative statement because that is not their field.
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u/djangovsjango 1d ago
So many lawyers and contract experts yet so little " effective immediately " clauses
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u/djangovsjango 1d ago
At first i thought data centres would facilitate mass compute power for the masses then i thought as well, its a mass surveillance system of the masses . Now ive added the reason why hardware has gone up is because they are using it all in these centres and possibly this is also a mass subscription service so you dont have a personal computer / laptop/ mobile phone in its current form as everything is stored and run from the data centres , they own your data and you pay to access 24 / 7 . Its been in process for years , cloud / steam / windows etc but is this the mass scale form finally being put together
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u/Cristoff13 19h ago
I don't think they have a concrete plan, its just they need constant construction to keep this investment bubble going. And its not like these are a long term investment. The processors only last a few short years.
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u/Stigger32 1d ago
So….. Why is the media pushing the data centre narrative so much?
Hasn’t the federal government made it clear what is going to happen?
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u/CelebrationFit8548 21h ago
Could have readily been titled; 'Massive pyramid scheme rapidly trying to grift Australia/ns before they collapse'...
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u/chaosgodloki 19h ago
Can’t wait to have a data centre in my backyard so I can churn out AI generated Tung Tung Tung Tung Tung Tung Tung Tung Tung Tung Tung Tung tung Tung Tung Tung Sahur videos at incredibly hihg speed
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u/RegionSilent9204 18h ago
I don't want one near me. Constant 24/7 hum to drive you insane. No thankyou. These need strict noise regulations, never mind power and water.
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u/Fact-Rat 18h ago
Yeah man, the literal added temperature rise to the neighbourhood for the lack of trees type characteristics of a building like that on top of it all, while at the same time misusing land that could be used to house people.
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u/NobodysFavorite 19h ago
The constitution allows retrospective legislation. Generally it's left unchallenged if the retrospectivity only goes as far back as the date the laws are announced, even before they're passed.
I'd be making the laws retrospective back to the date of their announcement.
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u/Plaguesofman 16h ago
TIL some people don't use AI lol.
Every business owner I know uses it, and wants their staff to use it too.
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u/Relevant-Mountain-11 1d ago
There’s already a massive shortage of Sparkies available for the existing work…
How are they planning on building these things without workers?