Norway faces scrutiny over large-scale data center developments

Norway is seeing significant activity and scrutiny regarding the development of large-scale data centers in various municipalities.

In Sirdal, the local council has welcomed a project by GreenScale, a company controlled by Deutsche Telekom Capital Partners, to build one of Norway’s largest data centers at Tonstad. The decision was made during an extraordinary council meeting without a formal impact analysis, despite growing global and domestic opposition to such facilities.

In Fyresdal, the municipal control committee has ordered an administrative audit following a controversial land sale involving the data center giant Edgeconnex. The municipality sold industrial land through intermediaries, resulting in the municipality receiving 110 million NOK, while the intermediary, Norsk Data AS, may have earned over 200 million NOK. The audit will investigate governance, ethics, and potential conflicts of interest regarding the roles held by local officials in the companies involved in the transaction.