Kat Jones might be the closest thing Scotland has to Erin Brockovich in 2026. Standing in the shadow of Arthur’s seat outside Holyrood, the 52-year-old is revving up the crowd of protesters around her. What about Aberdeen?” she calls to the crowd.
On Thursday, hundreds traveled to Edinburgh to call for an immediate moratorium on Scotland’s datacentre boom, which includes one project in Auchtertool, Fife, that has been billed as the second largest in the world. Jones, the director of the NGO Action to Protect Rural Scotland, has become the central node for the campaign demanding a pause to the buildout while the Scottish government produces analysis on the environmental impact of the centres, and clear planning guidance on the definition of a “green” datacentre. She is a whirr of action: greeting, encouraging, emailing and introducing.
Thursday’s protest was the biggest yet. In John Swinney’s programme for government on Tuesday, Scotland’s equivalent to the King’s speech, the first minister said he would take a strategic approach to datacentres with “expectations around environmental sustainability, resource use, community benefit”, but stopped short of agreeing to a moratorium. For the campaigners, this is not enough.
From Dubar to Greenock, there is fierce anger at the speed and scale of the projects in the planning pipeline. At least 20 are proposed so far, with more rumoured. Some are planned in the countryside not far from small villages, others next to care homes and residential houses.
Kathleen White, who is campaigning against a proposed £2bn datacentre in Lammermuirs hills in the Scottish borders, said the project did not make any sense in her area. The project is planned about a mile up the road. There’s a reservoir and an angling spot.
It’s an upland area with dark skies. The datacentre buildings would cover eight hectares of mostly concrete in a greenfield area. It is going to be a monstrosity,” she said.
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