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Four sites have been identified by the utility company, with two more targeted by 2026
France’s state-owned utility company Electricite de France (EDF) says it has identified four locations on its land that could be ideal for data centre deployment.
The energy giant says each site could host a data centre campus with 2GW of capacity, with the benefit of already being connected to the electricity grid.
“For digital companies who wish to do so, EDF will also offer personalized support for the end-to-end completion of the necessary steps to develop their project,” said EDF in an announcement.
The company added that the broad availability of nuclear power in France makes it a highly competitive environment when it comes to reliable, clean energy.
France currently has 57 active nuclear power plants, by far the most on the continent, with only Russia and Ukraine also passing double digits among its European neighbours.
EDF has been quick to capitalise on the AI-fuelled data centre investment boom, with reports last year suggesting the company has already entered into discussions with three companies to provide power infrastructure to three corresponding 1 GW data centre projects in France.
The identification of yet more possible data centre sites came alongside a slew of French infrastructure investment news this week, capitalising on the AI summit being hosted by the French government in Paris. The meeting saw meetings between major political and business leaders from around the world, seeking to align themselves on the technology’s future direction.
Before the summit kicked off, French AI unicorn Mistral announced that it is preparing to invest ‘several billions of euros’ to build its own data centre in the country. At the same time, Swedish startup Evroc has also announced plans to build a French hyperscale data centre.
Both of these announcements follow a major deal last week that will see the UAE announced that it is investing ‘up to €50 billion’ to build a 1GW AI data centre in France.
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