On a Wednesday afternoon, Jamie Robins walked to the entrance of Google’s UK headquarters in Kings Cross, London. He carried a letter containing a petition signed by nearly 55,000 people. The petition demanded that the tech giant abandon its plans to build a large new data center in Thurrock, a town located 15 miles east of London.
Robins works for Buglife, a wildlife conservation trust. He is part of a coalition of special-interest groups trying to stop the Thurrock development. The alliance includes local wildlife groups, environmental nonprofits, and the Thurrock Hammers motorcycle club. Each group has a distinct reason for opposing the project. Buglife and local conservationists fear the destruction of habitats for an endangered plant and rare bumblebees. The nonprofit Foxglove argues the facility will emit excessive pollution. The motorcycle club wants to return to racing on the site, which was formerly a disused stadium.
Unlikely Coalition Against AI Infrastructure
Members of these groups joined Robins outside the Google office. They held placards demanding the company search elsewhere for a location. Their demonstration was part of a wider wave of resistance against industrial-scale data centers across the UK. Companies like Google are rushing to build these facilities to meet the swelling demand for compute power needed to run artificial intelligence models.
The UK government is eager to encourage this development. Officials hope to capture a share of the hundreds of billions of dollars flowing into the AI industry. They also want to minimize the country’s dependence on foreign partners for computing resources. However, local residents are making their objections known. They are trying to delay or stop the construction of these massive facilities.
Adam Elman, director of sustainability EMEA at Google, told WIRED that the company shares the concerns raised by Buglife and other groups. He stated that Google expects the site to be developed sustainably. The situation in Thurrock highlights the breadth of resistance developers face as public opinion turns sour. Protests against data centers have occurred across Europe, including incidents at a Microsoft site in Amsterdam.
Thurrock Site and Planning Objections
The proposed Thurrock site sits next to a fuel stop where an arterial road meets the highway encircling London. The plot contains the remnants of Arena Essex, a disused motorcycle racing stadium. The area also features grassland with old footpaths and a lake. Google acquired the site through a subsidiary in 2023. The company applied for permission to build a data center campus there in May of last year.
When locals learned of the plans, they coordinated with national wildlife and environmental groups. They submitted 1,000 responses to the planning authority. Only one response supported the project. Thurrock Council noted that many of these responses came from people living outside the local area.
The protest group argues that Google’s proposal fails to account for negative effects. These include the loss of the raceway facility, destruction of flora and fauna habitats, and up to 570,000 tonnes of annual emissions. Foxglove claims these emissions cannot be accommodated under the UK government’s carbon budget.
Mark Sexton, director at the Thurrock Hammers motorcycle club, said the group is an outlier in the campaign. He noted that objecting on different grounds helps the whole movement gain attention. Google claims the objections are based on misconceptions. The company says it will achieve a net gain in biodiversity by retaining habitat and transplanting endangered plants. Google also plans to offset emissions by financing renewable energy generation, aiming for carbon neutrality by 2030.
Rob Pownall, founder of the nonprofit Protect The Wild, attended the demonstration. He expressed little hope for immediate success but viewed the protest as a step in a long campaign. Grassroots movements are starting to win concessions. In the US, some states have instituted permitting freezes. In the UK, a legal challenge by Foxglove recently forced the government to withdraw planning permission for a different data center.
Thurrock Council expects to rule on Google’s initial planning application early next year. The company will then need to submit a more detailed plan for a lengthy vetting process. Robins described the effort as a war of attrition, noting that planning campaigns can drag on for years.
Source: Wired
