“A server hall draws as much electricity as half a nuclear power plant creates”

It is Aftonbladet that examined how internet giants such as Google, Facebook and Amazon build server halls in Sweden with subsidies from the Swedish state.

According to the newspaper, the Löfven government has for several years “poured money” over the companies.

It is about million support and an electricity discount of 97 percent, despite the fact that it has provided few jobs and small tax revenues.

A report from the Electricity Market Inspectorate shows that server halls are very electricity-intensive.

Acute capacity shortages are now feared in several regions. The worst affected is Mälardalen. At the same time, Amazon is building several large server halls in that region, writes Aftonbladet.

According to a list obtained by the newspaper, a new server hall that draws 500 megawatts of electricity has been approved, more electricity than the whole of Uppsala consumes.

Another company has been given the green light for a server hall of 461 megawatts.

– It’s very much. It can be said that it is in the order of half a nuclear power plant, says Lennart Söder, professor of electric power at KTH, the Royal Institute of Technology, to Aftonbladet.

Since 2015, Svenska kraftnät has approved applications for a total of 1,322 megawatts and there are pending applications for 2,015 megawatts.