Guidelines for the implementation of Data Centers

The Lombardy Region with Regional Council Resolution No. 2629 of June 24, 2024 approved the "Guidelines for the Implementation of Data Centers."

Let's see, in a nutshell, its main contents.

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Why issue guidelines?

To provide, while waiting for the approval of a punctual regulatory measure, uniform guidelines to municipal administrations, including from the urban and environmental point of view.

What are data centers?

They are rooms, buildings or physical facilities that house the IT infrastructure for the creation, execution and deployment of applications and services and for the storage and management of data associated with those applications and services.

How are data centers classified?

Based on size, energy requirements and computing power. Specifically, they are distinguished into:

• Hyperscale: large facilities, with energy requirements of more than 100 MW, that have, as a rule, phased development with successive implementation times dictated by the gradual growth of service requirements for end customers.
• Colocation: medium-sized facilities, with energy requirements of more than 5 MW.
• Edge: usually small facilities (sometimes just a container), with energy requirements of less than 1 MW.
• Pure crypto-mining ("mining"): small containers or buildings with high energy requirements, but operated with a few simple resources.

To the above must then be added HPCs (high performance computing), which can be of various sizes and with different energy requirements, but, in general, are facilities with high demands on computing capacity for purposes such as artificial intelligence, machine learning, and other complex computing operations.

What is the intended use of data centers?

Data Centers are compatible with manufacturing and office uses.

Where can Data Centers be located?

Municipalities can assess the suitability of the location of medium and large facilities based on the following criteria:

• presence of adequate infrastructure and availability of low-cost energy (preferably renewable energy) or self-generation of energy, with priority given to idle sites or brownfield areas, areas to be regenerated, areas with low density of facilities, areas where system economies can be realized, ecosystem facilities (district heating, CER, ...), climatically more suitable areas;
• environmental risk;
• landscape quality of different areas;
• possible impacts on ecological networks and green networks for use;
• presence, nearby, of infrastructure, such as roads, tpl, waterworks, power lines, sewers, technological pipelines, etc;
• presence of other data centers or to the presence of other activities that could benefit from the aforementioned settlement, also for the purpose of safeguarding employment and productive fabric.

What environmental permits are required?

• Where the nominal thermal power of the emergency power units is greater than 50 MW, one falls into an activity subject to AIA, such that it is necessary for the proponent to acquire in advance the measure of exclusion from EIA or, in the case of a total power exceeding 150 MW, the measure of environmental compatibility, in priority to the issuance of the AIA and any other authorization.
• For medium and large Data Centers, it is necessary to verify, based on the municipal planning, whether the intervention falls within the scope of SEA.

What is the impact on the permitting process?

Applications for medium- and large-scale facilities must be evaluated at a service conference where the Province or Metropolitan City territorially concerned will give an opinion on the compatibility of the intervention based on the provisions of these guidelines.