THE GREAT BIG SWITCH ON IS COMING! BUT ARE WE READY?

The long-awaited increase in the UK’s electrical capacity is due in 2030, less than 5 years way. In total it is around 50 GW which, to put into context, is almost the equivalent of the UK’s entire peak electricity demand, with 1 GW being able to power over 2 million homes for a whole year.

Around London we are expecting upgrades to Uxbridge Moor, North Hyde, Amersham, Laleham and Slough East which are linked with around 30 data centres averaging above 100MWit per site, which amounts to well over £30bn of construction investment aligned with these upgrades. Combining these developments with secured power and across the wider UK including key growth areas; Manchester, Leeds, Northumbria, Wales and Scotland it is estimated that there is currently over £100bn of construction in Digital Infrastructure planned for the next 10 years.

This is amazing for the industry - but the question is - can we deliver it?

Being realistic, the power ramp up, is unlikely to come all at once on January 1st 2030, and will probably be a phased approach. However, if we also factor in the

impact of the number of planned Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) supporting the sustainable energy productions, it is likely we will see the UK getting close to its target and the planned digital infrastructure ahead within the time frame.

In broad terms this means that everyone in the sector will all need to find a way to increase output to meet this demand as well as encouraging new entrants to support.

But are we ready – well the answer is maybe at best and so we need to act now.

One of the issues is that the current UK market growth has been slow in line with the availability of power and compared with significant growth areas in other European regions.

The demand has been there, but the UK construction market has been affected by a number of challenges including the increased costs associated with fixed price risks taken before high inflation and covid debt and the government tax increases affecting investment and profit. In addition, the fallout from the collapse of

ISG left a huge hole in the market with over £1bn in debts and understandable trust issues we need a market reset in the industry focussing on the growth of the UK contractors with sustainable profits, client collaboration, focus on training linking in with colleges and universities and government support.

It is worth noting that none of this factors in the recent government’s “AI Opportunities Action Plan” announcement which commits to building a ‘cutting-edge, secure, and sustainable AI infrastructure.’ In the document it outlines plans for a dedicated 500MW data centre for public organisation use thereby suggesting that a much higher number of these dedicated AI 500MW data centres will be needed to service the private sector. Yet to date there is no mention of a plan to support the construction and manufacturing industries to meet the substantial growth of the data centre industry within the UK that this will entail.

Another thing to consider is that AI changes to digital infrastructure including a focus on higher rack densities ultimately requiring liquid cooling, has already significantly disrupted the industry. We are seeing design consultants who are running at full capacity to make changes with projects in flight and late in the design process. There is also an uncertainty around the pivot in which the manufacturing and materials industry is needed to meet the sector requirements including precision piping or commissioning boilers for heat load testing. This is against a backdrop of unknowns regarding the cost and the programme which is creating additional pressures on funders and developers

Finally let’s not forget the skills shortage. We will need a significant influx of people within the industry if we are set for £100bn of digital infrastructure development. At BCS we are proud of our apprenticeship programme and our athlete conversion programme coupled with our investment in training and people addressing this issue.

However, we recognise we still need to do more! If we assume we need 500 people per £1bn of digital infrastructure, we will need to have around 50,000 people in the industry to deliver it. And this doesn’t include the operations staff!

So, as an industry we need to drop our barriers, come together, meet the challenge and truly unleash the full potential of the UK digital infrastructure. This will mean changing our approach and supporting the construction industry to ensure they don’t take on all the risk. This can be done by the government or clients but we all need to pull together if we stand a chance of succeeding in delivering what is needed.