They\u2019re quiet from the outside. No smokestacks, no roaring machinery. Just vast, windowless warehouses humming away. But behind those walls, Australia\u2019s datacentres are consuming more power and water than ever \u2014 and the consequences are starting to draw scrutiny.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Australia is already home to around 260 datacentres, mostly clustered in Sydney and Melbourne, with dozens more in development. The rapid growth is being fuelled by artificial intelligence, cloud computing and our increasingly digital lives. Every streamed movie, online meeting, AI prompt or banking transaction passes through these facilities. It feels invisible. It isn\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At present, datacentres account for roughly 2% of electricity demand on the national grid. That might not sound alarming. But according to the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO)<\/a>, that share could triple within five years. By 2035, the industry may consume 21.4 terawatt hours annually \u2014 nearly as much as Australia\u2019s aluminium smelters combined.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Globally, datacentre electricity demand is growing four times faster than other sectors, according to the International Energy Agency. Hyperscale facilities \u2014 the kind built to power AI systems \u2014 can require 100 megawatts or more, equivalent to the annual electricity use of around 100,000 households. Multiply that across dozens of sites and the scale becomes clearer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The obvious question follows: who pays?<\/p>\n\n\n\n