A huge £1bn data centre for Park Royal gets go ahead from planners
Developers have pledged £3 million of community benefits, including a dedicated digital fund.
A £1 billion “AI ready” data centre that is set to be one of the biggest in London has been given the go ahead by planners.
The planning committee of the Old Oak and Park Royal Development Corporation (OPDC) – the body responsible for the regeneration of a large swathe of north west London – granted approval to the LON02 data centre.
The 56MW development will be at Premier Park in Park Royal on the site of a warehouse previously used by online retailer Matches fashion .
London still has an acute shortage of data centre capacity despite rapid growth in total space over recent years.
Construction will take around three years and it is expected to be fully operational by 2029. It will create hundreds of new jobs and the facility will contribute £2.3 million a year in business rates. When completed the 24,000 sq m facility is likely to be dedicated to one end user, probably one of the so called “hyperscaler” tech giants such as Microsoft, Google or Amazon.
The project is a joint venture between data centre operator and developer Pure DC and property company SEGRO.
The liquid-cooled data centre has secured 70MVA of dedicated power through a new substation connected to the national grid.
It has been engineered “ for high-density cloud and AI workloads, capable of supporting the most advanced GPU architectures and powering the next generation of artificial intelligence inference.”
The developers have committed to £3 million of community benefits, including a dedicated digital fund.
The fund aims to encourage 1,000 students to pursue a career in science and technology; support 150 local businesses to digitise their operations; and, put over 200 local residents through digital skills and employability training initiatives.
Contact Sarah Spateri for further information.
