Companies operating data centres should be obliged to provide electricity from heat generated from the facilities, according to a science expert.
Concerns have been raised about the efficiency of the centres, which used up 14% of all electricity here in 2021.
It comes after recent announcements that two Amazon data centres will be constructed in Dublin.
Science journalist Sean Duke says the heat generated from the facilities should benefit the local area:
"It kind of reminds me of the incinerator issue in Ringsend in Dublin where it was required that they were going to provide heat at a knockdown rate as part of the planning permission, so the houses in Ringsend and Poolbeg all got some kind of benefit because that's another thing with these data centers, when they come in the local people might not see that there's any benefit to them."
