The SPD, Alliance 90/The Greens and FDP parliamentary groups published an amendment on Tuesday to the German federal government’s draft bill for the planned Energy Efficiency Act. The law was also discussed in the Committee on Climate Protection and Energy and is expected to be finalised in the German parliament, the Bundestag, this week.
The Alliance for the Strengthening of Digital Infrastructures in Germany, which was founded under the umbrella of the eco Association, welcomes the last-minute adjustments to the draft law with regard to data centres.
Dr Béla Waldhauser, spokesperson for the Alliance for the Strengthening of Digital Infrastructures in Germany, said:
“As a data centre operator, I want to dispose of waste heat. I also have a vested interest in making new data centres. That’s why I think it only makes sense that the previously planned regulation requiring new data centres to be located within a five-kilometre radius of long-distance or local heating networks has now been deleted without replacement.
Proximity to supra-regional fibre-optic routes, a data hub, data centre specialists or to renewable energies for a sustainable and reliable power supply are also fundamental, which the previous draft had completely disregarded. The Bundestag has now shown foresight instead of short-sightedness.
The sharpening of the exemption regulation – keyword “readiness” – will probably also help to counteract the imponderables with potential waste heat consumers without having to give up on Germany as a digital location in the future. This means: data centres are planned from the outset with the possibility of waste heat disposal and, if necessary, are in a position to dispose of it at an acceptable time, technical and commercial cost.
It is all the more true: as the backbone of digitalisation, data centres are not only part of the solution to achieve the climate goals, but they are now also Germany’s economic engine.”
