The Green Party of England and Wales has called for a halt to new UK datacentre construction until rules on water and energy use are strengthened. It wants the government to remove blanket critical national infrastructure status from new facilities, arguing that the designation can give them undue priority over households and make local planning objections easier to overcome.

Datacentres were given critical national infrastructure status in 2024, but the party says approvals should require high environmental standards and full community consultation. It cites estimates that a large datacentre may use about 1.5 million litres of water a day, while the government says a blanket pause could deter investment, jobs and domestic processing of sensitive data; it says developers should nevertheless use water responsibly and prioritise clean power.