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Written question asked by Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated) on Monday, 31 March 2025, in the House of Lords. It was due for an answer on Monday, 14 April 2025. It was answered by Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour) on Monday, 14 April 2025 on behalf of the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero.

Energy: Data Centres

Question

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure connections to the electricity grid are sufficient to attract investment in artificial intelligence data centre infrastructure.

Answer

The Government is working with Ofgem and NESO to deliver fundamental reform to the grid connections process. Subject to Ofgem’s final decision this could release over 400GW of capacity from the connection queue, which will accelerate connections for AI data centres.

The Government have also sought expressions of interest to identify promising locations which can benefit overall grid infrastructure whilst still having quick project development times to remain attractive for infrastructure investment.

The Government is also setting up the AI Energy Council, through which senior representatives from both the energy industry and the AI industry will look at where best to locate AI data centres and proactively manage the energy requirements of AI. These efforts work in tandem with the Clean Power 2030 Action Plan.

Secondary information

Type
Written question
Reference
HL6380
Session
2024-26
Subjects
Energy National grid Artificial intelligence Data centres
Link
View this Written question on www.parliament.uk