Proposals for ‘Europe’s largest data centre’ in Havering opposed by residents
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/havering-thurrock-data-centre-council-digital-reef-greenbelt-b1163348.html?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1718024924
Posted by Dalecn
18 Comments
My favourite part of the article was
>He said: “Why not build three or four around the M25? But the land’s cheap here and fewer people to scream when you pour boiling water on them.
A data centre literally got refused next to the M25 recently because of NIMBYISM.
BANANAs – Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anyone
And people wonder why this country is crumbling, no one wants anything built and the law makes it easy to make that happen.
> The data centre will take between ten and twelve years to build, and the impact of lorries during construction will be intolerable in these quiet country lanes.
Fair enough
> The impact on the site, if it is built, would also be unacceptable: instead of farmland, there will be a large number of warehouse-sized buildings, containing banks of computers, batteries, cooling systems, backup power sources, and more equipment.
Land can have many uses. And yes, that’s what it will contain – what’s their point?
> If this development is allowed, it will set a precedent, and we would then lose more and more of our Green Belt. The Green Belt forms the lungs of our city, providing clean air as well as rich wildlife
There is almost no wildlife; rich or poor, on farmland.
> The plan to build such a massive structure on the Green Belt doesn’t just affect the residents of North Ockenden. If we allow this creeping industrialisation of our countryside, where will it stop?
Slippery slope fallacy.
> demand a tremendous amount of electricity and enormous quantities of water
the next line
> The campus will be powered by the substation in Warley, which some have argued will constitute a reliance on fossil fuels.
A spokesperson for Havering Council told the LDRS it will meet net-zero targets and not produce any emissions. It will be powered entirely by renewable sources and no diesel will be used in any back-up supply, the spokesperson said.
Let’s see if that follows through..
On balance the complaints about the suitability of the roads is fair, but the rest is just nimbyism. Seems to me that the project would create a lot of jobs and actually promote the implementation of renewable energy.
Looking at the article, residents are saying that it is building on the green belt and farmland. If this is the case i understand the objections.
Surely there are brownfield sites for this sort of thing?
At some point, the question of exactly what the end-game of NIMBYism is has to be raised.
What would be left? Some quaint villages with bad roads and bad internet, each centred around a derelict building which used to be a pub?
The jobs angle is largely bullshit. Anyone who has worked in a data centre knows that they are absolutely deserted, other than people making special trips to maintain something physically. The idea that the local people will going to work in their local data centre en masse is utterly delusional.
Environmentally, this is also nuts. It is going to be an enormous consumer of power, in a region where power is already in short supply. If you’re going to build something like this, build it in a place where it is well positioned to pick up the abundance of renewable power that will need to head down the county from Scotland.
Of course you can see why the locals don‘t want it – their quality of life will be degraded and they’ll get none of the upside.
I hate nymbism. It’s part of the reason why it’s so hard to build green energy. All they need to do is put up with Lorries as they build it and they get a wealth of opportunity and a landmark structure in Europe.
https://avalon.law.yale.edu/ancient/law_of_caesar.asp#:~:text=14)%20After%20January%201%20next,for%20building%20temples%20of%20the
14) After January 1 next no one shall drive a wagon along the streets of Rome or along those streets in the suburbs where there is continuous housing after sunrise or before the tenth hour of the day, except whatever will be proper’ for the transportation and the importation of material for building temples of the immortal gods, or for public works, or for removing from the city rubbish from those buildings for whose demolition public contracts have been let. For these purposes permission shall be granted by this law to specified persons to drive wagons for the reasons stated.
This is what Julius ceaser had to say on the matter. This does not help this discussion but incase someone found it interesting.
Labour’s manifesto has specifically mentioned stomping NIMBY’s for data centres.
A valid criticism is that it is yet another development project in/near London. Would much rather see this in the south west or the midlands
Havering is my borough. This will almost certainly go through. The project is worth billions of pounds and the council is already bankrupt and having to borrow loans from Central government and sell off remaining assets. This just goes to show why these planning applications should be granted more centrally.
We literally can’t build anything in this country because a couple old twats nearby living in their million pound country cottages say it doesn’t look nice
I find it insane that NIMBYs can try/can put a stop to this, yet by me they’ve just decimated everything around us, provided nothing for the local community and nothing was ever said and done.
People moan about NIMBYs but jesus, if they want to build something they fucking will because they’ve decimated huge fields by me to build training centres. Its absurd when the current road network already struggles.
I’m looking forward to incoming anti NIMBY laws
I was fully sympathetic until basically all building has ground to a halt as a result
So as a result we are just gunna have to make it a tough situation
Their is no other option because we have to build somewhere!
“We want economic growth! Wait…no…not like that!”
Not by residents. By old people who have nothing better to do than moan about progress being made in the country.
This country will continue to stagnate because of outdated planning laws and NIMBYs.