18OCT

Trebbin data centre starts before permit

2 min read

13:11UTC

The Brandenburg town of Trebbin said on 7 October that work has begun on two data-centre buildings and a substation while the state still reviews the operating permit.

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IndustryAssessed

Key takeaway

Construction began at Trebbin before Brandenburg decided the data centre's operating permit.

Trebbin, a town in Brandenburg south of Berlin, reported on 7 October that work has begun on two data-centre buildings and a substation under building permits already granted⁠¹. The operating permit, required under Germany's Federal Immission Control Act for plant that emits pollution or noise, is still under review by the state environment agency, the Landesamt für Umwelt Brandenburg. The building permits let the structures go up; only the operating permit lets the site run. Brussels is adding its own layer: in September the European Commission adopted an A-to-G energy rating scheme meant to grade large EU data centres from 2027.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Trebbin is a small town south of Berlin, in the German State of Brandenburg. A company has started building two data centres there, plus a substation, the equipment that connects them to the power grid. The town gave building permits. But the data centres also need a separate permit to operate, because their backup generators produce fumes and noise. Brandenburg's environment agency is still checking that application, so the buildings may go up before anyone knows the final operating rules.

Deep Analysis

Root Causes

Brandenburg offers land, wind and solar output and proximity to Berlin's network hubs, which draws data centres from the constrained Frankfurt market. The state's permitting agency is the bottleneck for operating approvals, not the town's building permits.

Germany's Energy Efficiency Act of 2023 adds efficiency and waste-heat duties for new data centres. Those rules sit alongside the immission permit, so a project in Brandenburg must clear both national efficiency standards and state emission review before it can run.

What could happen next?

Risk
The operating permit may impose conditions on generators or fuel storage after construction has begun.
Consequence
Brandenburg may draw more data-centre projects that would otherwise wait for capacity around Frankfurt.

Source Landscape

This story draws on neutral-leaning sources

Primary parallel: Tesla built its Grünheide car plant in Brandenburg under a series of early-start approvals while the full permit under the Federal Immission Control Act was still pending. The state granted that permit in March 2022, and Tesla carried the risk of tearing down work if it had been refused.

Counter-parallel: Intel prepared a site at Magdeburg in Saxony-Anhalt for a chip plant, then postponed the project in 2024 and cancelled it in 2025. Permits were not the obstacle there; funding and demand were, which shows a granted approval does not guarantee a building.

Consensus view: German law separates the building permit from the operating permit under the Federal Immission Control Act, which data centres need when their backup generators pass the act's size thresholds. Developers commonly start construction on the first while the state environment agency reviews the second, accepting that the operating permit may add conditions on emissions, noise or generator testing.

Counter-view: In Chile, seven data-centre projects asked for rulings that they fall outside full environmental review, several declaring diesel stocks just under the trigger tonnage. Brandenburg's route faces the review rather than designing around it, which costs time but leaves the project less exposed to later challenge.

Key tension: Whether the operating permit adds conditions that change a building already under construction, such as limits on generator testing hours or fuel storage.

Sources:Stadt Trebbin

Mentions:Trebbin →Brandenburg →Landesamt für Umwelt Brandenburg →Federal Immission Control Act →Germany →Magdeburg →Tesla →Chile →Brussels →Berlin →European Commission →Intel →

First Reported In

Update #16 · Malaysia bills data centres for idle grid

Stadt Trebbin· 18 Oct 2026

Read original →

Different Perspectives

Nexus Core Systems

Hired FiveNines Group, in a deal announced on 8 October, for early design, feasibility and permit work on a 20 MW AI data centre near Casablanca. It is the first named site of a planned 180 MW programme, still at concept design.

MC Digital Realty

Began building the 24 MW KIX15 data centre in Osaka Prefecture on 7 October, due to open in the fourth quarter of 2028. The joint venture of Digital Realty and Mitsubishi Corporation says it will then run 10 data centres in Japan with about 220 MW of IT capacity.

KT Cloud

Said on 7 October that it and Hyundai Engineering will build a 50 MW AI data centre at Cheongna, Incheon, from the fourth quarter of 2026. Completion is due in the first quarter of 2030, part of KT Cloud's target of more than 1 GW of AI capacity by 2031.

Town of Trebbin

Said on 7 October that work has begun on two data-centre buildings and a substation under building permits already granted. The operating permit under the Federal Immission Control Act is still with Brandenburg's environment agency, so the town postponed its public presentation.

Óscar López, Digital Transformation minister

Said in Madrid on 8 October that he hopes to approve the data-centre royal decree shortly, with urgent processing to reach the cabinet before the 29 November election. He said the final text will take the more than 600 submissions into account, without saying what changes.

Hydro-Québec

Defended its proposed Tarif CD before the Régie de l'énergie du Québec from 1 to 9 October, a rate for data centres of 5 MW or more that adds a premium when peak demand stays below 60% of forecast. Industrial consumers filed their own wording for the clause on who the rate covers.

Written with AI from Lowdown's published reporting. Not individually reviewed by an editor. Editorial standards.