Clare County Council plans for a new 1.2 billion Euro data centre campus on the outskirts of Ennis that will create 250 data centre jobs and 1,200 jobs during the project’s construction phase. The new data centre campus will comprise a vertical farm and six data halls designed on a flexible and modular basis, covering 145 acres or 1.3 million square feet. The site is located on Tulla Rd on the eastern outskirts of Ennis.
The promoters are seeking 10-year planning permission for an application with a net area for the development of 111 acres. The application site covers the townlands of Tooreen, Cahernalough, Muckinish, Knockanean, Ballymacahill and Roslevan. The scheme involves the demolition of a single storey farm dwelling house and eight farm buildings.
The planning application is to be accompanied by an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS). The applicant has been working on the project since 2018 and construction of the art data centre campus will be phased over a six-year period commencing in late 2022. The scheme has been designed by data centre specialists and will have access to 200 megawatts of power from both the network grid and gas generation on site.
“With Eirgird increasingly focused on data centres locating away from Dublin and the east coast to reduce pressure on existing grid infrastructure in those areas, projects like this can avail of underused grid capacity in other regions and tap into the growing number of renewable energy developments in the west and south of the country that offer clean sources of power,” Tom McNamara, development manager of Tom McNamara & Partners, said. “Additionally, more dispersed data centre developments like this help diversify economic growth and job creation to regions outside of Dublin.”
