Lombardy introduces increased charges of up to 200% for the construction of data centres in green and agricultural areas

There are already 33 active data centres in the Milan metropolitan area alone; a further 10 are under construction and 23 under evaluation.

If the Milan hinterland is the most 'targeted' area, an increase in interest is also registered in the other provinces: in the rest of Lombardy there are three already active, plus one under construction and five under evaluation.

 Lombardy alone accounted for 63% of the applications submitted throughout Italia.

The estimate of the Department of Local Authorities and Energy Resources is that of the 22 billion investments initiated throughout the country, half are concentrated on Lombardy's soil, on the basis of sudden plans, moreover, that will be developed in just five years.

Among those who have chosen to focus on the data economy, investing in Lombardy, are Amazon, Aruba, Eni and Stack Emea, to give a few examples.

'We cannot, in the light of these numbers, block the development of companies and employment, the race for artificial intelligence is already a fact,' says Lombardy councillor Massimo Sertori. 'We can, however, try to keep the phenomenon under control by avoiding excesses and the exaggerated exploitation of the territory.

The law, therefore, provides a strong disincentive to build in green areas, where the impact would not be environmentally sustainable, but at the same time the use of disused former industrial areas is favoured. In this case there are no additional burdens, but rather the law proposes bureaucratic simplifications.

With regard to the concerns about the risk of out-of-control energy consumption, councillor Sertori tends to downplay them, however: 'We have applications for 30 Gigawatts throughout Italia, half of which are in Lombardy. But in our area, seeing the real and more concrete projects, we should only authorise a maximum of 2 gigawatts of energy. With this law we intend to fill a gap, with certain rules and uniform procedures for investments'.

According to the Lombardy law Terna will be part of the steering committee and will map the availability of energy at the sites.

From the opposition spoke the democrat Matteo Piloni: 'In Lombardy we have tried to fill the void of the Meloni government on industrial policies. The development of data centres is necessary but it cannot be left to chance or to the market alone, a political vision is needed. However, this law lacks real and decisive soil protection, because neither the government nor the region have put in place stringent constraints. We will have to wait for a national law.