$1 billion Apple data center project in Athenry, Ireland cancelled

Apple has withdrawn its contentious proposal to build a data center in Athenry, Ireland after years of legal challenges.

Apple's cancellation of the plan comes two weeks after a High Court ruling allowed objectors to restart the appeal process. As a result, Apple would face years of hearings before it could break ground on the facility.

"Several years ago we applied to build a data centre at Athenry," Apple said in a statement to The Independent. "Despite our best efforts, delays in the approval process have forced us to make other plans and we will not be able to move forward with the data centre."

"We've been operating in Ireland since 1980 and we're proud of the many contributions we make to the economy and job creation," added Apple. "In the last two years we've spent over 550 million with local companies and, all told, our investment and innovation supports more than 25,000 jobs up and down the country. We're deeply committed to our employees and customers in Ireland and are expanding our operations in Cork, with a new facility for our talented team there."

Apple unveiled plans to build in Denmark and Athenry on the same day in February 2016. The project in Viborg, Denmark is complete.

The main spearhead behind the resistance to the Athenry data center was Allan Daly. Daly is an American-born immigrant and environmental engineer, and raised multiple objections to the data center. Daly's concerns centered around strain on the Irish electrical grid and no apparent plans to cope with greenhouse gas emissions from the data center.

Apple's project was initially approved by Irish planning councils, but Daly and fellow residents Sinead Fitzpatrick and Brian McDonagh appealed the decision to Ireland's An Bord Pleanala in Sept. 2015. The appeal wasn't granted, forcing Daly to the High Court for review of the case.

Apple's effort wasn't the only one that Daly wants stopped. Daly continues to battle a $1 billion Amazon data center in Dublin.

48 Comments

monstrosity 2227 comments · 17 Years

About 6 years ago

Daly sounds a pain in the ass.

ascii 5930 comments · 19 Years

It's an international market for these kinds of projects, you snooze you ...

henryblackman 58 comments · 20 Years

It's amazing how a single person can hold up progress. He'll be shutting down the looms in Nottingham next, a la Ned Lud.

This would have been a benefit to the Irish economy, and provide valuable high tech jobs - attracting other such roles to the area, as Apple does lead the way on this in Ireland. I don't understand the argument about the strain on the grid, and greenhouse gases... it'll get built somewhere else, AND Apple, of all company, is literally the best at using green energy.

I wonder if he'll win against Amazon too?

gatorguy 24609 comments · 13 Years

henryblackman said:

It's amazing how a single person can hold up progress. He'll be shutting down the looms in Nottingham next, a la Ned Lud.

This would have been a benefit to the Irish economy, and provide valuable high tech jobs - attracting other such roles to the area, as Apple does lead the way on this in Ireland. I don't understand the argument about the strain on the grid, and greenhouse gases... it'll get built somewhere else, AND Apple, of all company, is literally the best at using green energy.

I wonder if he'll win against Amazon too?

Data centers need very few employees. That Apple one might have employed fewer than a hundred including the janitorial folks if they're staffed like the others, so they aren't significant employment drivers. I don't think there were any additional plans for nearby energy infrastructure to support it either, it was just tying into the national grid AFAIK so it wasn't driving any other energy plant construction around it. Yeah there would have been a lot of short-term jobs building the data centre itself tho.

EsquireCats 1268 comments · 8 Years

It's all too easy to paint large corporations as evil and destructive with manipulative intentions.

But Apple's record on sustainability speaks for itself - this is a loss to Athenry. Apple will just build this somewhere else, enriching that local population with advanced energy infrastructure, energy competency, skilled employment and other sustainability projects similar to the ones that were proposed for Athenry.

Basically this Daly guy is maliciously exercising his rights as a citizen and doing a tremendous disservice to his area and Ireland as a whole - which is a significant importer of energy. Ireland needs more of these projects and fast.