The Netherlands is at a defining moment when it comes to the future of its digital infrastructure. According to ING Research, our country can technically function without further data center growth, but that would come with significant economic and strategic risks.
Restrictions on the power grid and land use planning mean that no new data centers can be built in Amsterdam and elsewhere until 2035. ING warns that this will put pressure on competitiveness, employment, investment and technological know-how - potentially resulting in billions of euros in lost economic growth.
The Netherlands is among the European leaders and in the top eight worldwide in terms of the number of data centers per capita. These centers are the beating heart of our digital economy - indispensable for AI, cloud computing, fintech and data-intensive innovation.
A prolonged construction freeze threatens to push companies toward other European countries, where infrastructure does allow for growth. AI startups in particular, which rely heavily on computing power, will be tempted to relocate. This threatens not only the departure of activity, but also a loss of knowledge, jobs and investment power. In the long run, this could damage the foundations of the Dutch digital economy.
Moreover, the impasse around data centers falters with Europe's ambition for digital sovereignty. Europe is already heavily dependent on American cloud providers such as Amazon, Microsoft and Google. Without sufficient local capacity, that dependence will remain - with consequences for privacy, data protection and strategic autonomy.
At the same time, scarce power capacity highlights another dilemma: How do you combine data growth with sustainability? ING and industry players advocate integrating data centers with renewable energy, such as wind and waste heat projects, so that growth can go hand in hand with energy transition.
According to ING, it is essential that the government takes the lead on location choice, energy supply and transparency towards citizens. Only with coordinated policy, in which government, energy companies and technology companies act together, can the Netherlands maintain its position as a digital leader and fulfill its ambitions in the areas of privacy, sustainability and innovation.
The data center crisis is thus more than an infrastructure issue: it goes to the heart of our digital autonomy, economic growth and technological future.
