The AI & Energy Clash
This cause is the next step on from our Big Idea, The AI & Energy Clash. The concept — site data centres where Scotland's wind is wasted, run them on that otherwise-binned clean power, and pipe their waste heat into community heating — is strong enough to be worth testing properly. So rather than just argue for it, we want to validate it: a short, credible feasibility briefing for Moray.
What we'd produce. A concise, independent briefing that pressure-tests the idea on real local numbers: how much curtailed wind is actually available near Moray's grid landing points; what a right-sized, flexible data-centre load could soak up; how much waste heat it would give off, and which communities (Forres homes, the Academy, the leisure centre and pool) sit inside the viable heat zone; the rough costs, the barriers, and whether it genuinely stacks up — honest about water, land and the real limits of 'wind-native' running.
Who we'd convene. A small community think-tank — local people with the right expertise (energy and grid, heat networks, planning, community energy, and anyone who has worked with data centres) alongside Sustainable Planet. Not to build anything, but to produce something credible enough to put in front of the developers and decision-makers already bringing data centres to Scotland.
What success looks like. A clear, well-sourced briefing that either shows the idea stacks up for Moray — in which case it graduates into a proper project proposal — or tells us honestly why it doesn't, which is just as valuable. Either way we'll have asked the right questions at the right time, while these decisions are still being made.
Why fund it. It's a modest, concrete ask: a short briefing needs some research and convening time, not millions. Open funding — give whatever you can, and it goes toward producing the briefing. And if you'd rather give expertise than money, even better: join the think-tank.
The full concept — the wasted-wind paradox, the wind-native idea, waste-heat-to-homes, the Scottish sites and the heat zones — lives in our Big Idea, The AI & Energy Clash. Read the argument there, and explore the sites and heat-provision zones on our EnviroWatch map. This cause is where we turn that argument into something tested.
Key figures (Scotland curtailed 10+ TWh of wind in 2025 and paid ~£343m to switch it off; data-centre waste heat is low-grade and boosted by a heat pump; district-heat loss is roughly 1% per km) are set out with full sources in the Big Idea. All figures indicative — firming them up is exactly what the feasibility work is for.