Plans for massive data centre at Corsham to be determined next week
The proposed facility is set to cost £250 million
Plans for a massive data centre to be built on former MOD land at Corsham will go before members of Wiltshire Council’s strategic planning committee next week (Tuesday, December 16).
Ark Data Centres wants to build the £250 million facility – its sixth in its Spring Park Campus – on an 18-acre site known locally as the Donkey Field, near the villages of Westwells and Neston and is close to Wadswick Green retirement village.
The proposed building will be 18.7 metres (61 feet) tall at its highest point and approximately 180 metres, or nearly 600 ft, long.
At its closest point, the proposed development would be 44 metres (144 ft) from the nearest house.
Residents have formed a group – Neston Westwells Action Group – to oppose the plans, and nearly 1,100 objections have been sent to Wiltshire Council.
Their concerns include the visual impact of the facility – which will be the first ‘outside the wire’ of the former MOD base – loss of amenity and biodiversity, potential noise pollution from the giant cooling fans, and – especially – flood risk.
The planning application was ‘called in’ by former Wiltshire Council ward member Derek Walters because “drainage issues remain unresolved.”
However, the applicant says that rain water will either be harvested and used in cooling the data centre, or will infiltrate through the ground into on-site ponds or soakaways.
Stringent drainage management conditions have been applied to the application to ensure that no water will run into the existing local drainage network.
And in the 55 pages of papers that will go before the strategic planning committee, Wiltshire Council departments including highways, rights of way, conservation, archaeology, public protection, landscape, ecology and drainage offer no objections.
The planning department recommends that the committee grants planning permission.
Ark says the data centre will help meet soaring demand for data storage, related in a large part to the public’s adoption of AI, cloud storage, and streaming services.
The company, which is headquartered at its Corsham complex but has a national presence, says the investment will create a further 87 new jobs, boost the local economy by £98 million, and provide an additional £4 million annual business rates.
Its clients include businesses including telecoms firms, banks, and video streaming services.
It also provides services to the government – although it will not confirm which departments – and every employee has government security clearance.
The campus is over the road from the MOD’s new Cyber Security Operations Centre and global operation and security control centre, which acts as a nerve centre for UK military operations around the world.
Lord Jonathan Evans, a former director-general of MI5, sits on Ark’s board.
A spokesperson said: “We’re extremely proud to be a Wiltshire company, creating hundreds of jobs for local people and investing millions of pounds in the local economy.
“Our proposal is part of our commitment to continuing the development of our Spring Park site as a secure, sustainable data centre campus.
“The best place to provide this additional capacity is as close to the existing Spring Park Campus as possible, and the proposed site is the best opportunity.
“Given the nature of the land uses surrounding the Spring Campus – with the Ministry of Defence operations to the north and east, and open countryside to the west – the land provides the only realistic site to deliver an adjacent expansion of the Data Centre Campus.
“Of course, there are homes nearby. We have taken great care to minimise the impact on our neighbours.
“Our planning application is accompanied by a comprehensive package of supporting documentation demonstrating technical and environmental acceptability and performance.”