Every photograph stored online.
Every streamed film.
Every banking transaction.
Every AI prompt.
Every hospital backup.
“The cloud” sounds weightless. In reality, it lives inside enormous buildings packed with servers, cooling equipment, batteries, transformers and diesel generators.
Increasingly, those buildings are being placed in Melbourne’s west.
There was no single announcement declaring the region Victoria’s data-centre capital. It happened one planning application at a time.
- One campus.
- One substation.
- One expansion.
- One approval.
Viewed separately, each project looks like another industrial development.
Placed together, they reveal one of the largest physical transformations now taking place across western Melbourne.
The finding
Victoria is approving and attracting major data-centre developments faster than it is building the public systems needed to account for their long-term footprint.
Operating campuses, staged expansions, approved developments and pending applications now extend through West Footscray, Brooklyn, Deer Park, Derrimut, Laverton North and Truganina, with larger concepts reaching towards Plumpton.
The Victorian Government says the state has more than 40 active data centres. It has committed $5.5 million to a Sustainable Data Centre Action Plan and promoted an investment pipeline potentially worth $25 billion [1] [2].
The investment case is clear.
The public account is not.
There is no single register showing, site by site:
- what has been approved;
- what has been contracted from the electricity network;
- what has been physically energised;
- what is being consumed now;
- how much water is being used;
- how much diesel is stored onsite;
- or how many permanent local jobs remain after construction.
In April 2026, the then Economic Growth Minister told Parliament the state would be “relentless” in pursuing data-centre investment [3].
That is an investment position.
It does not explain how the cumulative consequences of that investment will be measured across the communities hosting it.
What is already here
| Site or record | Location and status | Publicly stated capacity | What the record shows |
|---|---|---|---|
| CDC Brooklyn Campus | Brooklyn — operating and expanding | 350+ MW at completion | BK1 is operating. Remaining stages are under construction. The figure describes ultimate company capacity, not current demand. [6] [7] |
| CDC Laverton Campus | Laverton North — under construction | 400+ MW at completion | CDC describes combined Melbourne capacity above 800 MW. Active demand is not published. [6] [7] |
| NEXTDC M3 | West Footscray — operating and expanding | 225 MW planned IT load | At December 2025, 40 MW was built and 185 MW remained in development. [8] [9] [10] |
| 63 Sunshine Road | West Footscray — approved and amended | Not published | Permit issued in April 2025. A December 2025 amendment increased the building-height envelope by 1.92 metres. [16] |
| AirTrunk MEL1 | Derrimut — operating and expanding | 130+ MW | Capacity is disclosed through company reporting. Active operating demand is not itemised. [13] |
| Digital Realty MEL11 | Deer Park — operating | Not published | The company lists an 8,733-square-metre facility with 2N UPS and N+1 cooling, but no megawatt figure. [14] |
| STACK MEL01 | Truganina — listed campus | 180 MW across four buildings | STACK also lists a 135 MW onsite substation. The two figures describe different infrastructure measures. [11] |
| STACK MEL02 | Truganina — listed campus | 252 MW | The 5.6-hectare campus is associated with a substation exceeding 300 MW. Its precise energisation status is not clear from the public record. [12] |
| Microsoft Cawley Road | Truganina — operating | Not published | A June 2026 notice advised that generators would cover critical customer load during grid works. [15] |
| 171 Leakes Road | Truganina — approved and amended | Not published | Permit issued in April 2025 and amended in August. Aurecon is listed as applicant. The eventual operator is not named. [17] |
| 1 Oroya Drive | Truganina — approved | Not published | Permit issued in May 2026. The applicant is the trustee of GDCF Truganina Trust. [18] |
| 72–76 Cherry Lane | Laverton North — pending | 250 MVA ultimate capacity | Application received in May 2026. MVA measures apparent electrical capacity, not final IT load. [19] |
| 413 Francis Street | Brooklyn — pending and notified | 250 MVA ultimate capacity | Application received in May 2026 with 19 technical documents attached. [20] |
| 433 Mount Atkinson Road | Truganina — pending | Not published | July 2026 application for a three-building facility submitted through Goodman Property Services. [21] |
| NEXTDC M4, Todd Road | Port Melbourne — approved | 150 MW planned | Approved in January 2026. The initial stage is expected to begin at approximately 10 MW. [30] [31] |
| Victorian AI Hub concept | Plumpton — early concept | Unapproved | A proposed 500-hectare precinct near major transmission infrastructure. It remains a concept rather than an approval. [32] |
Two things stand out.
First, actual operating demand is absent from almost every public-facing record. NEXTDC is a partial exception because its financial disclosures distinguish built capacity from capacity still under development at M3 [9].
Second, the planning system does not connect the sites.
It records addresses, applicants, decisions and technical documents. It often does not identify the eventual operator or show how one application relates to a larger multi-stage campus.
The public can see the pieces.
It cannot easily see the machine.
1.57 gigawatts — sort of
Adding published company figures for CDC’s Melbourne campuses, NEXTDC M3, AirTrunk MEL1 and STACK’s Truganina developments produces a total of roughly 1.57 gigawatts [6] [8] [11] [12] [13].
That figure illustrates the scale of announced development.
It does not describe current electricity consumption.
Some numbers refer to eventual IT load. Others describe total campus capacity, substations or future stages that may take years to complete.
AEMO reported that 11 data-centre projects representing 5.4 GW of maximum demand were moving through transmission connection processes in early 2026. Forty per cent of that proposed capacity was in Victoria. Approximately 4.1 GW remained in application stages, while 1.3 GW had progressed to implementation [4].
Those figures are not proof of imminent grid consumption.
They are proof that the scale of proposed demand is no longer marginal.
Capacity is not consumption
An advertised maximum, a network connection, an energised stage, instantaneous demand and annual electricity use are different measurements.
Megawatts measure power at a point in time.
Megawatt-hours measure energy consumed over time.
Megavolt-amperes describe apparent electrical capacity before power-factor adjustments.
IT load refers to the electricity used by computing equipment.
Total facility load includes cooling, lighting, batteries and electrical conversion.
Power Usage Effectiveness measures the relationship between total facility energy and energy used directly by IT equipment [28].
These distinctions prevent false comparisons.
A 250 MVA planning application at Cherry Lane cannot simply be added to NEXTDC M3’s 225 MW planned IT load and presented as one clean total [19] [8].
Facilities are built and occupied in stages.
AEMO has noted that maximum connection capacity can take up to a decade to materialise [5].
But the opposite argument is equally incomplete.
The fact that a development is not fully operating today does not erase the infrastructure being reserved and constructed for tomorrow.
A clear public account requires four separate figures:
Who powers the cloud?
Data centres require uninterrupted electricity.
Renewable certificates and offsite power-purchase agreements can support additional renewable generation. They do not necessarily mean matching renewable electricity is physically available on Victoria’s grid during every hour a facility operates.
When wind and solar generation fall, supply must still be supported through batteries, hydroelectricity, interstate interconnectors, gas generation or remaining coal generation.
Data centres currently account for approximately two per cent of Australia’s grid supply. AEMO expects that share to triple by 2030 [5].
The Federal Government’s national framework proposes requiring large data centres to underwrite new clean-energy generation, fund their network connection costs, reduce demand during grid stress and adopt water-efficient cooling systems [25] [26].
The transition from policy announcement to enforceable obligation remains incomplete.
Purchasing annual certificates is not the same as funding generation, storage or network infrastructure capable of supporting demand when the facility actually requires it.
Water without a total
Data centres can reduce water use by relying more heavily on air cooling or closed-loop liquid systems.
That choice may increase electricity demand.
Evaporative systems can reduce power requirements while consuming considerably more water.
State guidance encourages water corporations to support non-potable or recycled water for large industrial users where feasible [23].
“Where feasible” is not a mandatory standard.
Questions raised in Parliament referred to 35 data-centre water-connection assessments, including one site seeking up to 3,940 megalitres each year [24].
The government did not confirm whether that volume had been approved. Nor did it provide a ten-year statewide projection for data-centre water demand.
CDC says its liquid-cooling technology uses virtually no water during primary cooling [7].
That may represent a significant technical improvement.
It does not remove the need for independently comparable, site-level reporting across the wider industry.
One project at a time
Victoria’s Development Facilitation Program is designed to accelerate planning decisions and attract investment [22].
The resulting public record varies widely.
The application for 413 Francis Street includes 19 technical documents [20].
Other entries provide only brief summaries or decision notices.
Where the Planning Minister acts as the responsible authority, standard council processes and some community VCAT review pathways can be displaced [29].
Post-approval amendments can make the final development difficult to follow.
Permits for Sunshine Road and Leakes Road were both altered after their initial approval [16] [17].
The concern is not that amendments exist. Planning systems must accommodate legitimate design changes.
The problem is cumulative.
Each project is assessed as a separate proposal. No applicant is responsible for seeking approval for the combined industrial concentration emerging across western Melbourne.
As a result, no single assessment answers the larger questions.
- What does the full buildout mean for electricity?
- Water?
- Road access?
- Emergency response?
- Noise?
- Industrial land?
Why the west?
Data centres need access to high-capacity electricity, fibre networks, large sites and room to expand.
They also benefit from proximity to users, businesses and existing network infrastructure.
Melbourne’s west provides relatively lower-cost industrial land without placing facilities far from the city’s commercial and population centres.
NEXTDC promotes M3 partly on its location approximately 10 kilometres from the CBD [8].
That proximity has commercial value.
The west is not merely supplying vacant land.
It is supplying strategic access to Melbourne.
That value belongs in any serious discussion of public return.
Built by hundreds, operated by dozens
Large data-centre projects generate substantial construction work.
That should not be confused with permanent employment.
Peak construction numbers, indirect employment, contracted trades and long-term onsite jobs are often presented together in public announcements.
CDC refers to thousands of indirect jobs across its developments [7].
NEXTDC provides detailed information about capital investment and capacity but does not publicly identify a detailed long-term operational headcount for M3 [9].
The useful comparison is not between a data centre and vacant land.
It is between a data centre and other productive industrial uses competing for the same serviced land.
Relevant measures would include:
- permanent jobs per hectare;
- permanent jobs per operational megawatt;
- local procurement;
- municipal rates;
- infrastructure contributions;
- and long-term economic return.
Without those numbers, broad employment claims remain difficult to test.
The physical cloud
Data centres are not silent warehouses.
They contain cooling equipment, transformers, battery systems and backup generators designed to operate when the grid cannot.
In June 2026, Microsoft advised nearby residents that grid works at its Truganina site would require large backup generators to run across two days [15].
A complete public record would show:
- total onsite fuel storage;
- generator testing schedules;
- actual generator run-hours;
- low-frequency boundary noise;
- battery and fire-management systems;
- emergency access arrangements;
- and environmental performance after commissioning.
A planning approval confirms that documentation was assessed at a particular stage.
It does not prove that operational impacts remain negligible throughout the life of the facility.
The missing page
The information exists in fragments.
Planning authorities record permits.
Operators publish investor presentations.
Water corporations assess connections.
AEMO tracks grid proposals.
Emergency services review technical risks.
None of those systems provides a single public account of what is happening across Melbourne’s west.
That is the central problem.
Not that data centres exist.
Not that investment is occurring.
Not that the infrastructure is unnecessary.
The problem is that a region can become the physical home of the cloud without any public institution being responsible for showing residents the complete picture.
Final finding
Melbourne’s west is becoming Data Centre Ground Zero.
The development is being built site by site, stage by stage and permit by permit.
Its consequences will not remain confined to individual property boundaries.
The public deserves an account measured at the same scale as the industry itself.
Source-number audit
The supplied draft’s source list ends at [32], but late claims cited unrelated entries or missing numbers. The publication applies four transparent corrections based on the supplied source titles:
- The Power Usage Effectiveness definition now cites
[28], the supplied energy-efficiency guide, rather than[29], the planning-system guide. - The planning-pathway claim now cites
[29], the supplied planning-system guide, rather than[30], a permit record. - The NEXTDC M4 row now cites
[30]and[31], the supplied permit and NEXTDC pipeline records, rather than[32]and missing[34]. - The Victorian AI Hub concept now cites
[32], the supplied Syncline Energy submission. The draft’s companion[35]reference is absent from the supplied list and has not been invented.