Around 200 residents of Tinghøj, north of Varde, are fighting plans for a Microsoft data centre of five halls, each 500 metres long and 32 metres high, not counting chimneys. The plans are still only on the drawing board, DR reported.
Jeanette Lund, a spokesperson for a dialogue group set up by Varde Kommune, said people in the town are angry, unhappy and deeply insecure. "We're just ordinary Mr and Mrs Jensen, and now a UFO lands in the back garden," she said. "We live in my husband's childhood home, and if it comes, we'll move. Last summer nearly every house displayed a for-sale sign, and residents light candles outside the town hall in silent protest at council meetings.
On Lolland, Karina Tyron Sahner lives just outside Nakskov, where two large data centres are planned, one with a capacity of one gigawatt. Denmark's maximum electricity consumption is seven gigawatts, according to Energinet. "The municipality gets information from those making the projects and trusts them 100 percent, while we're seen as whingers," she said.
Her citizen proposal, "No thanks to data centres on Lolland", already has enough signatures to go before the council.
Marianne Nielsen of Tølløse, south of Holbæk, signed a similar proposal, as have nearly 1,000 others in the municipality. "It has to be more thought through than this, so you have to take it up nationally and consider where they should be located," she said. The local climate association Ét Grønt Holbæk is behind it, and the council was consider it that evening.
Søren Bak Sommer, spokesperson for Ét Grønt Holbæk, now also speaks for the newly founded Folkebevægelsen Mod Datacentre. "We've been caught in a storm of resistance," he said. "There's a gold rush right now. Datacenter Industrien estimates there are around 55 data centres in Denmark, and Ingeniøren has mapped 29 more on the way.
Business minister Martin Lidegaard (R) has announced a national strategy covering the need for new data centres, who should build them, and where they should sit to best serve the grid and get renewable energy. Several mayors have called for national guidelines. "Greater openness about energy consumption and resource consumption is one of our political demands," Bak Sommer said.
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