Data Centre Sustainability Reporting Obligations

Data centre operators must act now to comply with the reporting requirements under the EU regulation establishing an EU-wide scheme to rate the sustainability of data centres. Our Planning & Environment team discusses what data centre operators need to do to meet the 15 September 2024 deadline.

Data centre operators must act now to comply with the new EU sustainability reporting requirements. These requirements are outlined under the new delegated regulation ((EU) 2024/1364) (the Regulation). This establishes an EU-wide scheme to rate the sustainability of data centres. The Regulation, which we previously reported on, places significant obligations on data centre operators to report on certain sustainability criteria. The first reporting deadline under the Regulation is 15 September 2024.

Background

The Regulation is directly effective in Ireland, meaning that it does not need to be transposed in national law. It was adopted to supplement the Energy Efficiency Directive (the Directive). The Directive, unlike the Regulation, must be transposed by Member States into their national legal systems. At the time of writing the Directive has not yet been transposed in Ireland.

Both the Regulation and the Directive contain reporting obligations for data centre operators.

The first reporting deadline under the Directive, as set out in Article 12, was 15 May 2024. However, given the Directive has not yet been transposed in Ireland, this deadline was missed. If the Directive is transposed before its next reporting deadline of 15 May 2025, we anticipate this date will be set as the first reporting deadline. However, the Irish implementing regulations, once transposed, should provide certainty on this date.

Reminder: what do data centre operators need to do before the Regulation deadline?

The Regulation requires data centre operators to report prescribed information and KPIs directly to the European database established by the Commission by 15 September 2024 and then by 15 May every year thereafter. At the time of writing, the Commission database has not yet been made publicly available. The Commission has stated that the database is being prepared and that it will be available for the first reporting deadline.

This obligation applies to the operators of data centres with an installed information technology power demand of at least 500kW.

The information that must be communicated to the European database, as set out in the annexes to the Regulation, is twofold:

Annex I sets out the general information that must be reported. This includes basic details about the data centre, such as ownership, location and type of data centre.

Annex II lists the more specific KPIs that must be reported including, amongst other things:

• Installed information technology power demand
• Floor area
• Energy consumption and renewable energy consumption
• Battery capacity
• Water usage
• Water input, and
• Waste heat re-use

The Regulation allows a data centre operator to avail of a “comply or explain” approach in its first reporting period for certain KPIs if it cannot gather the necessary data for technical reasons.

Conclusion

The immediate next step for data centre operators is to gather the relevant data, or technical reasons for not being able to gather the relevant data. Operators should communicate this information to the European Commission database by 15 September 2024.

For more background on the Directive please refer to our previous article.

For more information and expert guidance on the Regulation and Directive and what your business needs to do to ensure compliance, contact a member of our Planning & Environment or Corporate Governance & Compliance teams.

The content of this article is provided for information purposes only and does not constitute legal or other advice.