Building the planned data centre near Rødby will require more than just a large site. If the full project is realised, more than one gigawatt of power will also have to be supplied to the facility.
In a preliminary site plan, project developer Stender has outlined data centre buildings covering a total of just over 328,000 square metres. The plan indicates a power demand of around 960 MW.
- That is the level of power we expect the data centre itself to require at full operation. It means that slightly more than one gigawatt of electricity will have to be supplied to the facility, Allan Egeris Arentsen, CEO of Stender, tells FemernBusiness.
Energinet has put Denmark’s peak electricity demand at around 7-7.5 GW. The data centre’s potential requirement of just over one gigawatt therefore corresponds to roughly one seventh of the country’s total electricity demand at peak load.
Power supply in progress
The plan is for the project to be built and commissioned in several phases. Stender is therefore exploring different ways of drawing power from the grid rather than applying for the full capacity all at once.
- We have submitted several screening requests to both Cerius and Energinet. They cover different amounts of power and possible connection points, because there are several substations in the area and because we are trying to adapt the project to the capacity that may be available, says Allan Egeris Arentsen.
No agreement has yet been reached on the power supply for the data centre. The CEO hopes that one can be in place within the coming months.
- We expect to have an agreement with Energinet on power for the first phase in place at the beginning of 2027 – perhaps even before the end of this year. The power supply and the local development plan are the two biggest pieces of the puzzle, and ideally those processes need to move forward roughly in parallel.
Stender expects the local development plan to receive final approval in the fourth quarter of 2027. If the timetable holds, construction could begin in early 2028, according to the project developer.
