Drax Group has agreed a partnership with Brookfield and its AI infrastructure platform Radiant to develop up to 1GW of data centre capacity at Drax Power Station near Selby in North Yorkshire. The companies announced the plan on 3 November, saying a first phase of up to 100MW could be operating from the first quarter of 2028 if planning, regulatory and commercial conditions are met.

What has been announced

Under the arrangement, Drax will provide the land, oversee power integration and lead the planning work. Radiant, a UK-headquartered business owned by Brookfield, will handle design, construction, operation and the search for customers. Capital is expected to come through Brookfield’s AI infrastructure joint venture with Qatar-based Qai, alongside the other partners.

No tenant has been named and no final investment decision has been taken. Drax said a community consultation would begin shortly, with a formal planning application to follow in the coming months. Drax CEO Will Gardiner described the power station as one of the few UK sites able to supply “large-scale reliable power directly” to data centre customers.

The key numbers

• Up to 1GW of total capacity is targeted on the 1,000-acre estate, with growth beyond 2031 needed to reach that figure.
• Phase one: up to 100MW, targeting commercial operation in Q1 2028 and drawing power from the grid through existing station infrastructure. Brookfield puts its cost at about £2.5bn.
• Phase two: about 500MW between 2028 and 2031, which could be supplied directly from Drax’s generation through a behind-the-meter arrangement.
• More than £20bn in total investment, including IT hardware, if the campus is fully built out, according to Brookfield’s estimate.
• About 4GW of grid access and 2.6GW of dispatchable generation already exist at the site.

Conditions and open questions

Later phases depend on regulatory approval. Drax’s Contract for Difference for biomass generation runs from April 2027 to March 2031, and supplying a data centre directly from its biomass units during that period requires consent from the UK government and the Low Carbon Contracts Company. Data Centre Review reports that the contract allows Drax to request up to 500MW of generation capacity for a data centre, subject to that approval.

The project also follows a setback. A joint bid by Drax, North Yorkshire Council and the University of York for AI Growth Zone status was not selected by ministers; Drax says the new plan does not depend on that designation. Environmental campaigners have criticised the use of biomass, a point likely to feature in the consultation.

Why it matters for modular and edge in Europe

Selby is a hyperscale-sized proposal rather than a modular or edge project, but it illustrates a trend that shapes the whole market: power, not land, is now the scarcest input. Former generation sites with large existing grid connections are becoming prime data centre locations, and the UK’s long connection queues push developers towards sites where capacity is already in place.

The phased structure, starting at 100MW on grid power and moving to on-site supply later, is the same staged logic that prefabricated and modular builders sell to smaller operators: deploy what the available power supports, then add capacity as connections and approvals arrive. Large co-located campuses at power stations may also compete with smaller regional and edge projects for scarce electrical equipment, skilled labour and political attention. How the government handles the biomass approval will be watched as a signal for other power-station conversions across the UK.

Sources

• Drax Group – Drax, Brookfield and Radiant announce partnership at Drax Power Station
• Data Centre Review – Drax partners with Brookfield on £20bn-plus AI data centre plans
• Techerati – Drax announces £20bn AI data centre plans in North Yorkshire
• DatacenterDynamics – Drax partners with Brookfield and Radiant for up to 1GW data center