Quantum DC will pause its plan for a 1200-megawatt AI data centre in Tungkillo, in the Adelaide Hills, after what the base reporting calls deep frustration, anger and protests from the surrounding community. It's the first sign of data centre development in retreat in South Australia. Nobody in a boardroom decided to be reasonable. People turned up and made the project too costly to push through.
What People Actually Did
In western Sydney, a group called Stop the Slop is run by a core of eight people, mostly twenty-somethings, aged 21 to 32. Christie Duong started it after watching data centre resistance in the US and then digging into what was proposed for her own area. She found the scale, connected with other young people across the region, and they began campaigning on social media.
"We want to knock out all of [the data centres] because they're just shady in general," Duong said.
Their target is a plan at Kemps Creek, near three schools. One outlet reports it as a $7 billion project, another as $9 billion. If approved, US technology company AirTrunk would put data hall buildings across 52 hectares of vacant land, with a power capacity of 1.2 gigawatts, roughly the annual electricity consumption of about one million Australian homes. Duong keeps her tactics flexible. "Visibility is important, but I think there are other things in the background that make things fall through, and we really want to be strategic about how we target [data centres]," she said. The group plans education sessions and more social media outreach.
The wins are stacking up. A proposed AI data centre on Sydney's Cooks River was scrapped over the weekend, reportedly after Kogarah residents protested. Goodman Group abandoned a hyperscale data centre at Lane Cove in September following outrage among residents. An application in the Blue Mountains was withdrawn in June after community backlash.
Who Gets Notified, and Who Doesn't
Then there's Project Pluto. The $1.1 billion data centre in Guildford West would sit next to a sports ground and run 24 hours a day. It was approved in July. It received no public submissions, and many locals say they were never told it existed. A petition to stop it has since collected more than 5000 signatures. Approval first, awareness later. That's how the paperwork works.
What They're Calling "Consultation"
Belinda Dennett, CEO of Data Centres Australia, the industry's peak body, says members are still grappling with "getting community consultation right." Her complaint is about timing. "Communities want early engagement, but they also want detailed answers, so there is a bit of a trade-off. Often, early engagement means you don't have all those answers around design plans, around energy source, around how much water that may use," she said. Read that again. Companies want to ask for community input before they can say how much water or power they'll take.
Plan PM, the project manager on Kemps Creek, says it undertook extensive stakeholder engagement and is working with relevant bodies on the issues raised. Its July amendments cut the project from six buildings to three.
The Reform Trap
The politicians are circling. The SA government criticised Quantum DC's consultation process and is preparing legislation to regulate the industry. AI minister Chris Picton said the pause shows why the government wants "proper regulatory control" to manage "energy, or water, or land use." He also said data centres were left out of the state's Royal Commission into Artificial Intelligence because they're "completely separate things."
Opposition leader Ashton Hurn said no one wants them in the backyard "because no-one really understands what they're needed for in the first place." One Nation's Cory Bernardi wants a pause until a parliamentary inquiry finishes, and what he called "a community licence." The Greens want a moratorium. A NSW parliamentary inquiry made 23 recommendations, including requiring AI companies to properly listen and respond to community concerns, and urged the government to plan for large-scale development in precincts with shared energy and water infrastructure.
Dennett wants something else: "The quicker we have certainty, the more viable I think Australia's going to be." Certainty for operators and investors. Westpac Economics says investment in Australian data centres is estimated to top $155 billion in the coming decade, with about 165 operating and 225 planned. The NSW government credits data centres and renewable energy for helping keep the state economy out of recession.
Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles said this week the suburbs were "not a place where you would have data centres." Duong's reply: "I feel like if this gets approved, then what does it mean for the others? Like, how far can [data centres] push this?"
Every cancellation so far came after residents organised, not after a regulator stepped in. The legislation is still being drafted.
- data centres
- community opposition
- quantum dc
- south australia
- tungkillo
- adelaide hills
- airtrunk
- kemps creek