DataVita Submits Planning Application for DV4 Data Centre at Chapelhall

DataVita has submitted a planning application to North Lanarkshire Council for DV4, a new data centre at Chapelhall, marking the next phase of a campus the company has operated for more than a decade. The site forms part of the Lanarkshire AI Growth Zone, a regional initiative aimed at attracting digital infrastructure investment to central Scotland. The submission comes as Scotland sees a wave of speculative data centre announcements, though DataVita says its track record distinguishes this project from proposals that are unlikely to materialise.

DV4 is the latest addition to DataVita's existing operations in Chapelhall, where the company runs DV1, Scotland's largest purpose-built Tier III certified data centre. The firm is also currently constructing DV3 adjacent to the existing facility and operates a second data centre in Glasgow. DataVita is a key supplier of cloud services to the Scottish public sector through the Scottish Government's Cloud and Hosting Services framework, underpinning critical services used daily across the country.

The planning application for permission in principle is supported by a comprehensive suite of technical assessments covering energy and decarbonisation, noise, air quality, transport, flood risk and drainage, ecology and landscape, heritage, ground conditions, economic impact, and construction environmental management. DataVita held four public consultation events to shape the development design, with community feedback leading to several adjustments. The maximum building height has been reduced from 30 to 26 metres, operational plant has been relocated to the south of the building away from residential areas, and approximately 1,000 metres of new native hedgerow will be planted—at least double the length being removed.

A feasibility study is underway for a community garden and greenhouse that would be warmed by surplus heat from the data centre, an idea raised by residents during the consultation period. The initiative would be funded through a community investment fund, reflecting DataVita's efforts to integrate the development with local priorities. Danny Quinn, Managing Director of DataVita, said, "We have seen a lot of data centre speculation in Scotland recently, and the vast majority of it will never be built. DataVita has been operating in Scotland for more than ten years, and we already underpin a lot of the critical services used day in, day out across Scotland. We built DV1 at Chapelhall, we are building DV3, and we run them ourselves with a Scottish team. DV4 is the next stage of that campus." He added, "Not all data centres are the same, and we are keen to change the public perception. Scotland has an opportunity not only to become a data centre location but an exporter of intelligence via low-carbon data centres. We don't think of exporting barley when we talk about the success of our whisky industry, and data centres should be no different. The application is now with the council and open for comment, and I would encourage people to look at the detail."

DV4 is designed to meet the four criteria the Scottish Government recommends for green data centres, positioning it as a model for sustainable digital infrastructure in the region. The facility will run on 100% renewable electricity backed by certificated Scottish generation, with an efficiency target of a power usage effectiveness below 1.25, ahead of the recognised European benchmark for cool climates. Cooling for the facility is closed loop and sealed, with no evaporative cooling, and a water usage target of 0.05 litres per kilowatt hour or lower. Heat recovery is integrated from day one, and DataVita is in discussions with the new Monklands Replacement Hospital and the neighbouring BioCity campus on the reuse of surplus heat.

DataVita has also gone "well beyond" typical requirements at this application stage on air quality assessments, modelling deliberately extreme scenarios including every standby generator across DV1, DV3 and DV4 running simultaneously and a continuous 72-hour emergency—conditions that have never occurred. In more than ten years of operation, the Chapelhall campus has not experienced a single grid power cut, and DV1's standby generators have been needed for just one hour of unplanned running in that decade, outside routine testing. The development represents £849.6 million of construction investment over two years, supporting 2,650 construction job years and 120 permanent skilled roles on site, with apprenticeships, and at least 40% of capital contracts expected to be delivered by local suppliers.

The application underscores the growing demand for sustainable, high-availability data centre capacity in Scotland, particularly as public and private sector workloads increasingly migrate to the cloud. DataVita's emphasis on community engagement and environmental performance reflects a broader industry shift toward responsible development, as operators seek to align digital growth with net-zero targets and local economic benefits. With the planning application now open for public comment, the outcome will be closely watched by stakeholders across the Scottish digital infrastructure landscape.