Why data centres are like dinosaurs

You'd notice a Tyrannosaurus rex in your street. Dinosaurs are meant to be extinct, and their arrival would cause serious damage. When data centres show up in local regions, the risks aren't as immediately apparent. Industrial developments aren't Mesozoic carnivores, but picturing them as such helps us imagine the impacts they may have on the planet. 

"Nature was quick to pass the sponge of her deluges over these awkward sketches [the dinosaurs], these first nightmares of Life." French author Auguste de Villiers de L'Isle-Adam wrote these words¹ long before the invention of "artificial intelligence" (AI). Today, the data centres needed to support AI systems have become one of the nightmares of our time. Our digital world will always need such facilities, but their proliferation has caused real alarm. 

Backlash against data centres may not be as big as big tech, but many communities are now concerned about the industry's rapid, multi-billion-dollar expansion². Given the complexity of hyperscale proposals, I spoke with Shay Dougall—a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the University of Sydney—to explore data centre disquietude more deeply. 

Don’t rush first and risk assess later  

Kathryn Carter: “You cannot protect the environment unless you empower people, you inform them, and you help them understand that these resources are their own, that they must protect them,” Kenyan political activist Wangari Maathai once said³. As a resident of a region where a hyperscale data centre has been proposed, do you feel your community has been well enough informed on the potential environmental impacts?

Shay Dougall: Absolutely not. Not only are they not informed, they are also not given an opportunity to consequentially participate. Residents are completely kept out of the process. The Western Downs Digital Park (WDDP) is Australia's largest proposed internationally-owned data centre, planned near Dalby here in regional Queensland. Despite the scale, the application process only requires approval by local government. Why would they have the ability to approve when the nation is still having conversations on data centres more broadly?

Kathryn: A recent survey conducted by Primara Research—among a nationally representative sample of 1,000 Australians—found that 83 per cent would oppose having an AI data centre in their local area⁴. Yet the Dalby community wasn’t included in initial consultations?

Shay: In Dalby, the development process has actually excluded any local involvement. The initial application is available online, and you can see that it has evolved over time, with each stage facilitated and fast tracked by the various government departments the company is expected to engage. This evolution shows that the data centre was not thoroughly thought-through or risk assessed before it was proposed. 

Kathryn: As a scholar who focuses on the lived consequences of industrial development, you feel we still need to agree on who gets to participate in the development data centres across Australia. As of today, who do you believe holds the most influence?

Shay: It’s big tech. 

Kathryn: In the words of investigative journalist Carole Cadwalladr, the broligarchy⁵?

Shay: Yes, it absolutely is. We’re seeing the same pattern we saw in the gas industry. Politicians were approached by international companies and told that if approvals weren’t made quickly, they’d take their business elsewhere. We were made to decide quickly and fast track approvals. 

Kathryn: Does the speed feel like a strategy to you? Because the speed allows for nothing else. 

Shay: With urgency, companies can push their way through politicians, forcing urgent decision-making with no supportive legislative frameworks. They did it with gas, and now they’re doing the same thing with data centres. Big tech companies are telling decision makers that urgent approvals must be made, otherwise they’ll build somewhere else. 

Slow down to see human impact 

Kathryn: Speaking recently to ABC's flagship current affairs program 7.30, you said that it's the scale and the magnitude of the data centre industry and the particular project impacting your community that concerns you⁶.  “Its impact is not going to be just on one property, its impact is going to be community wide,” you say. Can you provide specific examples?

Shay: We talk a lot about economics and jobs, but the actual impact will be on water and power supplies. In 2025, Western Downs Regional Council released its Water in Western Downs report⁷. One finding from the report was that “the scarcity of secure high-quality water has the potential to put the feasibility of all current large-scale industrial projects at risk.” So where is that water going to come from? 

Kathryn: According to the development website⁸, the WDDP “has been designed around an independent water strategy so it does not rely on the local reticulated drinking-water network.” What does that mean?

Shay: In a drop-in session recently, I was told the centre would be air cooled, but there’d still be water required. They’re going to catch that from their massive roof, apparently, catch it from the rain. 

Kathryn: But what happens when there’s a drought? 

Shay: I mentioned that we were on the precipice of our next major drought, but the rep laughed and said they can still gather water when it does rain to store and use. But my question then becomes: what are you removing that would otherwise become water for the ecosystem? When it does rain here, that water does go somewhere. It goes to our creeks and our rivers; our towns and our farmers. The data centre’s massive roof is hoarding water, they’re not magically creating water by having a roof. That water is being taken from the local ecosystem. 

Kathryn: To accommodate an international guest. WDDP is being developed by Zerra DC but its first tenant will be AI frontier lab Anthropic. Capital Brief has also reported⁹ that the site will be “powered by coal and gas as a bridge until renewables to support the facility are built.”

Shay: The gas required for the gas-fired power stations they’ll need to build must be extracted from land owned by local farmers, who must agree to let gas companies onto their properties. So that’s another massive impact for the local community. Beyond extraction, the cost of running new stations is significant, as are the extra emissions. Weren’t we supposed to be decarbonising the planet?

Kathryn: American writer Lucille Clifton reminds us all that the earth is a living thing¹⁰. Do you feel earth is treated as such?

Shay: We’re not treating it in that way, no, and we’re not treating ourselves as part of it. Professor John H. Knox was the first independent expert on human rights and the environment appointed by the Human Rights Council¹¹ in 2012, he’s always said that humans and nature are one and the same. If we want to do the right thing by ourselves, we have to do the right thing by the planet. 

Turn your attention from tech to the planet

Kathryn: “It is impossible to achieve a harmonization of man and nature without creating a human community that lives in a lasting balance with its natural environment.” Political philosopher Murray Bookchin wrote these words¹² in 1964. Do you believe that harmonisation will be possible with initiatives such as Victoria’s Sustainable Data Centre Action Plan?¹³

Shay: No, that’s not at all possible. Initiatives like this assume that data centres can be sustainable, which means there’s a prior assumption that we must accept more data centres as necessary. But the question that still hasn’t been asked comes before that.

Kathryn: The question of whether or not Australians want to host hyperscale data centres?

Shay: Yes, exactly. The Australian government views large data centres and artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure as an economic imperative to secure the nation's digital future. As a result of that position, they feel we must make sure the planet, the environment and the people are ready to accommodate this shift. It should be the other way around. We should be asking whether data centres fit in with how we want to live, not changing how we live to suit the infrastructure. I think the questions that are being asked are being asked back to front.

Kathryn: ATO reports reveal that some of Australia’s biggest data centre operators paid no tax in the 2024-25 financial year, despite reporting hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars¹⁴. Meanwhile, construction of new facilities is accelerating across the country. Do you believe companies should be made to contribute more given the extent of the footprint they hope to occupy on country?

Shay: Yes, of course they should pay tax, the same way as every other industry and individual. We keep getting told that data centres are a good investment, but who for? Who will profit? Data centre operators haven’t been paying tax and neither do gas companies. We could be gaining billions of dollars a year from the latter if they were taxed; that alone could solve the housing crisis. 

Kathryn: Commenting recently on the priority of most Australians—regarding where we ought to invest hundreds of millions of dollars into new fiscal infrastructure—Dr Ben Eltham said¹⁵: “I’m pretty sure they’d put houses for people well ahead of centres for data.” These comments were made during a Crikey News podcast dedicated to exploring the question: Is the ‘Nerd Reich’ gaslighting Australia on data centres? I mention this as it feels evident that more and more people are questioning where the money is going and why. 

Shay: Which brings us back to the importance of consequential participation. If we were better informed, we could make more impact. Instead, communities are kept uninformed because of the learned response of the government. That response involves raising shiny ballots about economics alone, not including the people in conversations. 

Prioritise becoming part of the conversation

Kathryn: What questions should community members ask when faced with the prospect of becoming neighbours with data centres?

Shay: During the WDDP drop-in session, I asked what the developer would do if there was significant community pushback. To the degree that it became obvious that the data centre was not welcome in the community. The rep said he’d have to take that question back to his team. 

Kathryn: If the council has already identified a scarcity of secure high-quality water in your region, you’d think the developers would be aware. That fact alone is reason enough to warrant community concern, something else you’d imagine developers would be prepared for. 

Shay: They’re clearly not prepared for, or thinking about, the community response, not the WDDP developers or the government. The Mayor of the Western Downs Regional Council was also featured during that 7:30 report, and he was gung-ho about the hyperscale data centre, yet his community is saying no. There’s a massive divide. That’s why I tell people to ask their local governments, and developers, what they would do if the community asked them to leave. If the response is that they don’t know what to say, then that says a lot. 

Kathryn: “What is man doing anyway cluttering up everything?” Oodgeroo Noonuccal once said¹⁶.  “We’ve already got to the stage where there’s no return. This madness to conquer everything they see.” The poet spoke these words in 1977, describing how she “was horrified at all these space things all over the place” when she’d visited America. Decades later, do you feel this same sentiment could be applied to the rapid development of data centres?

Shay: Absolutely, she’s on the money there, she absolutely is. There’s another aspect, too, a bit more of a me version of what Noonuccal said. Our government, big industries, and these 1%ers think that this is an empty landscape just waiting for them. It’s not, it’s already a productive landscape, it already has a purpose. 

Kathryn: Beautifully said, lately I keep thinking about sacred land, too. As Central Land Council writes: "Aboriginal sacred sites are commonly parts of the natural landscape such as hills, rock outcrops, trees, springs, creeks and offshore reefs – places that are not always spectacular or even interesting to the unenlightened non-Aboriginal eye.” Sacred site protection is essential¹⁷. 

Shay: I love that, absolutely. 

Kathryn: How can we create a future where consequential participation becomes core to all community development? 

Shay: I think it’s about what you said at the beginning of conversation. People need to be informed, and empowered to take action. John Knox says that we’re part of nature, and that our human rights are intertwined with the environment in which we live. 

Kathryn: “States should ensure a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment in order to respect, protect and fulfil human rights,” he writes¹⁸. By nurturing Mother Nature, we nurture ourselves and one another. 

Shay: It all comes back to community. When we’re informed, we can mobilise. As Maathai words remind us, we can’t protect the environment unless we empower people.