A new “green” data centre being proposed in Edinburgh could use more power than half a million homes and cause more carbon emissions than the city’s airport.

Campaigners are sounding the alarm over the environmental impact of artificial intelligence (AI) and fear councils and the Government are allowing vast data centres to be built without proper environmental scrutiny due to “greenwashing” by developers and tech firms.

The UK currently has around 500 data centres, vast warehouses hosting powerful servers needed for things like streaming, social media and AI. This number is expected to increase by almost a fifth over the next five years as demand for data grows. New Feature

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A planning application has been submitted for a vast new data

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