The Malaysian Ministry of Energy Transition and Water Transformation (Petra) has this week said that it will address sustainability issues in the data centre industry – but will that cause problems for some data centre businesses now in development?
As the Data Centre Dynamics website reports, deputy minister Akmal Nasrullah Mohd Nasir has said that, in light of the National Energy Transition Roadmap (NETR) launched last year, Petra will encourage data centre investors to meet sustainable development goals.
The Ministry also plans to launch the Corporate Renewable Energy Supply Scheme (CRESS), a system that will offer open grid access where a third party can supply or buy electricity through the grid network system with a set system access charge.
The system will give corporate consumers access to green electricity by allowing them to procure it directly from a renewable power producer.
The Ministry of Investment, Trade, and Industry is also getting involved; it is expected to announce energy and water-efficient standards for data centres in Malaysia next month.
As we have reported in the past, Malaysia has seen significant data centre investment over the last few years, much of it because of a 2019 Singaporean moratorium, now eased, on data centre development.
However, the Edge Malaysia news service has highlighted adverse assessments from country risk and industry research group BMI, part of Fitch Solutions a leading provider of insights, data and analytics. BMI suggests that the sustainability-linked regulatory framework proposed by Petra may carry some degree of risk for data centre builders and operators already engaged in the construction of campuses or facilities that may not be compliant and may need upgrading.
It also suggests that data centre investments in Malaysia may even slow down due to the new operational requirements if some investors are unable to meet them, conceivably benefiting neighbouring markets with fewer power issues and less stringent sustainability regulations like Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines.
