Green light for €500m data centre in Wicklow
A €500m data centre has been given the green light for Arklow, Co Wicklow.
The Echelon facility will see 450 jobs created during the construction phase, and 90 full-time roles when completed.
The 484,000 sqft data centre facility will be located in the Avoca River Business Park in Arklow.
Planning permission was originally granted by Wicklow County Council in February but was the subject of an appeal which has now been dismissed.
"Clearly, the decision removes a significant uncertainty for us and clears the path to delivering a facility that will enhance Ireland’s developing data centre offer, meeting growing demand from global organisations in e-commerce, telecommunications, digital broadcasting, AI and the internet of things," said COO of Echelon Data Centres, Graeme McWilliams.
"Power supply has been secured and the Arklow facility will deliver 100MW of capacity to the market. This is sizeable in its own right, however, when combined with the site we have in development in Clondalkin - and further sites we have identified - we will be in a position to offer hyperscale tenants a potential 300MW of capacity in an Irish availability zone.
"Today’s ruling shows that Ireland is open for data centre business, and that the necessary decisions can be taken within a framework that allows developers a level of certainty. As the dataverse – the amount of data that is created each year – is set to triple in size by 2025, demand for facilities such as ours will increase rapidly and Ireland is well-placed to accommodate them.”
The site is expected to be occupied by the end of 2021.