Data centres, Italia accelerates rules to push capital

Behind every artificial intelligence algorithm or storage system are walls and kilometres of cables: data centres. In Italia, the race to build these new cathedrals of data and energy has already begun, bringing investment in the asset class to dizzying heights (over 7 billion in the last three years). But as is often the case in Italia, the complexity of the regulatory system - in this case even more so the absence of a specific regulatory framework - has so far slowed down authorisation systems and the ability to fire the capital involved. In the absence of clear and certain rules, together with the risk of speculation and virtual network saturation, the country could miss the train to develop infrastructures that are, to say the least, fundamental for digital life.

To avert this hypothesis, there are several regulations in the pipeline, but operators are waiting to understand their real impact. The government has recently intervened with the bill decree, which came into force on 21 February, and which introduces an administrative regime for the construction of new data centres. While waiting for possible changes to the text when it is converted into law, at present the heart of the rule lies in Article 8, which establishes a single procedure for issuing authorisations through the services conference. A procedure that should reduce the timeframe and conclude within ten months after the application is made, with a possible extension of three months only in exceptional cases. "It is a single step that, however, contains all the old steps," simplifies Silvia Gnocco, founding partner of the firm Inzaghi specialising in the sector. The lawyer explains that the first real knot in this formulation is the competent subject: the authority that manages the Integrated Environmental Authorisation (IEA). "The IEA is only triggered above 50 megawatts of power, but many plants on the market are smaller. Identifying the single procedure manager in the authority that manages the IEA risks excluding smaller projects or, on the contrary, flooding the offices with applications for unnecessary environmental permits'.

The single authorisation issued downstream of the conference includes every necessary permit act, from the environmental impact assessment (EIA) to the landscape authorisation, to the authorisation for water use or emissions. "For the operator, it means having to anticipate in the building design phase even important operational choices that will then be implemented two or three years later, and to define plants, emissions and energy needs immediately in order to prepare the application," adds Gnocco. The decree is also currently silent on the effects of urban planning variants: 'In the absence of explicit changes, the single procedure can only be applied downstream of conforming urban planning. This means that if the chosen area requires an implementation plan, this must be obtained in advance'. The risk? Shortening the time of the final bureaucracy, but greatly lengthening the time of the initial one.

Locally, the most dynamic regulatory framework is in the areas most affected by real estate developments, such as Lombardy. The Metropolitan City of Milan published a Thematic-Territorial Strategy on the subject in May, but the process is at a standstill. The Lombardy region, on the other hand, has defined a regional law that is now in the hearing phase. With regard to the latter, Gnocco sees elements of complementarity with the framework of the bill decree. "There is a division of tasks: the former simplifies the process, but the regional law defines the substance by aiming to take over the AIA but confirming the role of the provinces in the concertation tables for plants between 10 and 50 MW. The data centre is brought back to the productive destination, but under the 50 MW threshold the compatibility with the directional one remains, and the settlement on agricultural land will entail a 50 per cent increase in charges'.

The evolution of the legislative framework also walks on the legs of the delegated law on data centres, which was approved at first reading in the Chamber of Deputies on 24 February. The law aims to transform data centres into public utility infrastructures, focusing on the recovery of brownfield sites and sustainability. The introduction of a single national authorisation process, according to Sherif Rizkalla, president of the Italian Datacenter Association, which contributed to the law with technical support, "can allow Italia to bridge the investment gap with its European neighbours, standing as a candidate for the new Mediterranean hub". Putting clear guidelines and regulations on the ground will be the challenge to ensure that bureaucracy does not hold back investment.